The legends of the saints 9780823204403

Table of contents :
Frontmatter
Preface to the First Edition (page xi)
Preface to the Third Edition (page xv)
CHAPTER I. GENERAL IDEAS (page 3)
CHAPTER II. THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND (page 12)
CHAPTER III. THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER (page 49)
CHAPTER IV. THE CLASSIFICATION OF HAGIOGRAPHICAL TEXTS (page 86)
CHAPTER V. THE DOSSIER OF A SAINT (page 101)
CHAPTER VI. PAGAN MEMORIES AND SURVIVALS (page 119)
CHAPTER VII. SOME HAGIOGRAPHICAL ERRORS (page 170)
Father Hippolyte Delehaye: a Memoir (page 187)
Bibliography of Scientific Works by Hippolyte Delehaye (page 229)
Index of Saints (page 247)

Citation preview

THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS ,

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THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS by

HIPPOLYTE DELEHAYE Bollandist

With a Memorr of the Author by

: PAUL PEETERS Translated by

DONALD ATTWATER

VN iy FORDHAM UNIVERSITY PRESS New York : 1962

deputatus.

Nihil obstat: Hubertus Richards, S.T.L., L.S.8., Censor Imprimatur: E. Morrogh Bernard Vic. Gen. Westmonasterii, die 25a Septembris, 1961.

The Nihil obstat and Imprimatur are a declaration that a book © or pamphlet is considered to be free from doctrinal or moral error. It is not implied that those who have granted the Nihil obstat and Imprimatur agree with the contents, opinions or statements expressed.

© 1962, Geoffrey Chapman Ltd.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 61-18761

MADE AND PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN

Father Delehaye’s Les Légendes hagiographiques was first published, at Brussels, in 1905 and a second edition

in the following year. A third edition, revised by the author, appeared in 1927; this was reprinted in a fourth

edition in 1955, withthe addition of a memoir and bibliography of Father Delehaye by Father Paul Pee-

ters. ,

An English translation of the second edition, by Mrs. V. M. Crawford, was published in 1907 under the title The Legends of the Saints: An Introduction to Hagio-

graphy. The present new translation has been made from the current 1955 edition. The numerous footnotes of reference have been collected together at the end of each chapter. Those notes which add something to the text are distinguished by an asterisk in the textual reference.

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CONTENTS

Preface to the First Edition. ; ; ; ; xl Preface to the Third Edition _. , , . ; XV CHAPTER I. GENERAL IDEAS Hagiographical documents. Imaginative narratives. Literary compositions. ‘The romance. Creations of the people. ‘The myth. The tale. The legend. The hagiographical legend; its

two chief factors . . , , . ; ; ; ; 3 Notes on Chapter 1. , ; , , , , , , 10 CHAPTER II. THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 1.—Unconscious distortion of truth by the individual, — by the people. Low level of general understanding. Tendency to simplify. Lack of knowledge. Substitution of the abstract form for the individual type. Poverty of invention. Borrowing and spread of legendary themes. Examples. Great

age of some themes. Artificial grouping of persons and

happenings. Cycles , ; , ; , . , , 12 II.—Predominance of sense impressions over ideas. Localizations and identifications. Literary origin of some of these.

Legends arising from pictures and statues. Popular etymology. Miracles. Crowd psychology. Vigour of expression. Intensity of feeling. Ambitions of particular churches. Mass

morality. Local claims . , . . , , , . 28 Notes on Chapter IT , . . , , , ; ; , 40 CHAPTER III. THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER I—Meaning of the term “hagiographer’. Literary genres. Moralities. The ancients’ idea of history. Particular objects

of medieval hagiographers .. , ; , ; . 49 II.—Sources. False attributions. Written tradition. Oral

tradition. Pictorial tradition. Fragments of the past. Selection of sources. Interpretation of sources. Inscriptions. Use

of various kinds of document. , ; . , , 99 III.—Dearth of material, and how it was supplemented. Amplification from stock. Acts of St Clement of Ancyra. Compilation and adaptation. Life of St Vincent Madel-

garius. An old proceeding. Forgeries . ; ; , 68

Notes on Chapter IIT, , , . ; . ; ; . 79

Vil )

CONTENT S—contd. | CHAPTER IV. THE CLASSIFICATION OF HAGIOGRAPHICAL TEXTS

, Defective systems. Classification by subject, — by categories of saints. System adopted; historical standpoint. Divi-

sion into six classes. These applied to Ruinart’s Acta

sincera. Le Blant’s “Supplement” , , , , , 86 Notes on Chapter [IV , , , , , , ; , 99 CHAPTER V. THE DOSSIER OF A SAINT Documents concerning St Procopius of Caesarea. The account by Eusebius. Evidence of cultus. The three legends. Summaries of them. The synaxaries. Latin Acts of St Proco-

pius. Adaptations to St Ephysius and to St John of Alex-

andria. Conclusions ; , , , , , . 101

Notes on Chapter V , , ; , , ; , . . 17 CHAPTER VI. PAGAN MEMORIES AND SURVIVALS I.—Rites and symbols common to Christianity and ancient

religions. Suspect practices. Incubation. Collections of miracles. Literary borrowings from pagan sources. Inevit-

able analogies. Superstitions . , , , , , . 119

{{.—Hero-worship, and the veneration of saints. The centre of hero-worship. Ceremonial translations. Relics. Fortuitous

coincidences , . ; . , , . , . 126 IiI.—Holy places. Christian transformations. Change of

dedication. Ascertaining primitive titles. Holy wells . . 131 IV.—Dates of festivals. Change of object. Coincidences difficult to prove. Fallacious dating of pagan festivals.

Examples. ; , ; , ; . , ; . 138 V.—Pagan legends. Christian adaptations. Three kinds of case. Examples: the legend of St Lucian of Antioch. The legend of St Pelagia and its fellows. St Liberata or Wilge-

fortis, etc. . , , . , , , . . . 143 VI.—Mythological names. Other suspicious names. Iconographic parallels. The Blessed Virgin Saints on horseback . 156 Notes on Chapter VI , , : ; , ; ; , . 161

CHAPTER VII. SOME HAGIOGRAPHICAL ERRORS Not separating a saint from his legend. Excessive trust in hagiographers. Incautious appeal to local tradition. Con-

fusion between a likely and a true narrative. Excessive Importance given to the topographical element. Utter con-

tempt for legend . , ; , , ; , ; . 170 Noteson Chapter VII. . ; , , ; . . . 182 viii

CONTENT S—contd.

Father Hippolyte Delehaye: a Memoir. - © - ~~. 18/7 Noteson Memoir. ; ; ; . . ; , . » 225 Bibliography of Scientific Works by Hippolyte Delehaye. 229

Index of Saints... ee RT

x

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PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

The recent advances in scientific hagiography have given rise to

more than one misunderstanding. The application of historical criticism to the Lives of the saints has achieved results which contain nothing very surprising for anyone used to working on written

documents and interpreting other records; but they have not failed to upset the ideas of many other people.

There are religious people who have just the same reverence both for the saints themselves and for everything that has to do with them; and they have shown alarm at certain conclusions which, they think, are inspired by an innovating spirit at work even within the Church, and are highly prejudicial to the good name of the heroes of the faith. ‘This feeling is often expressed in trenchant style. If you are of the opinion that the biographer of a saint has been unequal to his task, or that he has not attempted to write history, you are accused of attacking the saint himself, because, it seems,

he is so powerful that he would never allow himself to be compromised by an inadequate panegyrist.

Or if you express doubt about some marvellous happening, which is well-calculated to enhance the saint’s glory but has been reported by the writer on insufficient evidence, you are at once suspected of lack of faith.

You are accused of bringing rationalism into history, as though it were not above all else necessary to weigh the evidence when dealing with questions of fact. How often accusations of destructive criticism, of being iconoclasts, are hurled at men whose sole

XI .

XH THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS concern is to find out the true worth of the various records of the cultus of saints, who are never happier than when they are able to say that one of God’s friends has found a biographer worthy of him !

It might be supposed that the application of such considerations to the attitude of suspicion that so many good people take up to-

wards historical criticism would be enough to show how unjust their prejudices are. But it is not all that easy to overcome a reaction which they think true piety requires. The conditions in which many accounts of martyrs and lives of saints were composed are too little known to people in general to allow of a ground of understanding. Many readers are not enough on their guard against the vague notion that hagiographers have a mysterious privilege which exempts them from those mistakes of human frailty to which every other kind of writer is liable. We therefore believe we shall be doing a useful work by trying

to set out, more clearly than usual, the various kinds of writings our pious authors produced, by outlining the origins of their compositions and by showing how far they were from being protected from making errors that exact history is bound to point out. It will be well to caution the reader once for all against an impression which might be got from a study which is mainly concerned with the weak points of hagiographical writings. To give help in recognizing material that is of poor quality is not to deny what there may be of good; tares are sometimes mingled with the wheat to an alarming extent, and to draw attention to them is to save the crop.

Those simple narratives of the heroic age which one would say

were written with a pen dipped in the blood of martyrs, those unaffected stories, fragrant with religion and goodness, in which eyewitnesses relate the heroism of dedicated maidens and ascetics, these call for our unreserved respect and admiration. But for that very reason they must be most carefully differentiated from a numerous class of laboriously elaborated writings in which the saint’s features are clouded in a thick mist of rhetoric, and his voice stifled by the voice of his biographer. The distance

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION xill between these two classes of writing is infinite. The one is easily recognized and carries its own recommendation; the other is too often overlooked, and does harm to the first.

It will be obvious that there is a big difference between the simple process of sorting-out, the need for which we are trying to demonstrate, and the wholesale work of destruction which we may be suspected of undertaking. Moreover, if we recommend anyone who feels drawn to hagiographical studies to pursue them in a resolutely critical spirit, we do not advise him to do so blindfold; we should not dream of disguising the fact that to misapply methods of research, however good in themselves, can lead to deplorable results. This may easily be seen by reading through the chapter in which we examine some questions touching that mythological exegesis which is so much in vogue nowadays. Certain glittering performances in this field have dazzled the eyes of people who are more impressed by novel conclusions than concerned about their trustworthiness. We were bound to ask for them to be checked, and to indicate how it can be done. It has not been our aim to write a full treatise on hagiography. Many questions that may suggest themselves to the reader have not even been referred to, and we do not profess to have exhausted any of the subjects on which we have touched. Quotations and examples could have been multiplied indefinitely. It surely was not wrong to resist the temptation to dazzle the reader by a cheap display of learning, and to avoid everything

that might complicate the exposition without adding anything necessary to the argument. The aim of this book is briefly to show the spirit in which hagio-

graphical documents should be read, to sketch the method for discriminating between materials that the historian can use and those that he should leave to poets and artists as their property, and to put readers on their guard against being led away by formulas and preconceived ideas.

So far as possible, controversy—a bad counsellor—has been kept out of the book. At the same time we have here and there had

X1V THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS to draw attention to other people’s mistakes. Unhappily, faulty methods often take shelter under respected names, and sometimes, when criticizing errors, it looks as if one is attacking persons. It is a proper matter of regret for the critic that in the thick of the fight he sometimes hits those at whom he is not aiming. Please understand, we have not aimed at anybody.

Some chapters of this study first appeared in the Revue des Questions historiques for July 1903. They have been touched up

| Brussels , , and added to in a few places.

13 March 1905

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION

The Legends of the Saints has been out of print for a long time, and we have decided on a new edition because there has been an

insistent demand for it. Naturally, the text has had to be reexamined. Scientific hagiography has progressed during the past twenty years, and we cannot ignore this.

On the other hand, the book in general remains just as it was before. To work over it again from top to bottom, to bring in all the developments that might be wished, would have entailed the repetition of what we have had occasion to say in special works, to which we take the liberty of referring the reader.

The bibliography called for some bringing up to date. It would have been easy to lengthen it by adding from sources that

can now be found anywhere. We have preferred not to overburden it. Several well-wishers have communicated the impression which they have received from reading The Legends of the Saints and have suggested various ways of improving certain chapters. I am

sincerely grateful for their observations; at the same time they leave me rather puzzled. Some find that the book is not clear cnough; others, that it is too clear. It is difficult to please everybody, but I will try to clear up at any rate some misunderstandings.

In the first place, there is no question whatever of the saints being put on trial. They are often mentioned, as Achilles would be | in a study of Homer. But Achilles is not Homer; and the shadowy, nameless persons who are the proper object of our researches are XV

XVI THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS not saints. If fault can be found with them, it casts no reflection - on the citizens of Heaven. It is also worth recalling that hagiographical texts are not the only documents we have on the history of saints; they form a separate category, but there are others. The Bibliotheca hagiographica latina is a very long list indeed of saints’ Passions, Lives, Translations, Miracles, and at its beginning the Bollandists remark: “Tt is not infrequent for more trustworthy or older evidence to be found in a chronicle, in annals or some similar work, in a poem, an

epitaph or an inscription. Thus the history of the emperor St Henry must be sought in Thietmar of Merseburg’s Chronicle and the Annals of Hildesheim much more than in his Life; the history of the queen St Clotildis in Gregory of ‘Tours rather than in the

| Vita Chrotildis’. Many more examples could be given. — Some readers complained that our work had a too uniformly destructive tendency; they would like to have seen, by the side of debased hagiography (which they would not dream of defending), more space given to those writings about the saints of which no one questions the value. We must confess that this opinion surprises us. If there 1s the

least attempt at destruction in these pages, it is wholly directed against the notion—as widespread as it is stubborn—that in these matters there is a close connexion between the subject of a narrative and its value as history. It would be difficult to exaggerate the disintegrating effect of this principle, which is implicitly accepted by very diverse kinds of people, though not openly admitted. In virtue of it, credit is given to too many stories that are incompatible with the seriousness of true religion; in virtue of it, we often hear talk of saints who in fact never existed, of saints who are the successors of the ancient gods, even of saints who are gods in disguise.

Unless I am mistaken, it is eminently constructive to explain how authentic documents may be recognized, to show what signs distinguish them from those that are not authentic. Has Mabillon ever been blamed for having, in his De re diplomatica, set out rules which convict very many documents of being forgeries, docu-

ments which before his time were commonly confused with

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION — Xvil authentic state papers? Is it possible to build up an old city without doing a certain amount of demolition ?

It is a serious mistake, and a very common one, to think that when a saint’s story is declared to be legendary all is lost, that that discovery brings the saint himself into disrepute. Christian saints are not like Turnus or Dido. Saints have a real existence, outside written documents. ‘Their memory is perpetuated and lives on in

the very life of the Church, and it is not without reason that the Bollandists so carefully gather up, side by side with the saints’ Acts, the facts which establish what is called their posthumous glory.

We have shown what can be learned from these facts by giving a concrete example. The current legend of St Procopius provides no data for a grasp of his individuality. A few lines by Eusebius and the indisputable vestiges of his ancient cultus enable us to place him in the full light of history.

It is perhaps timely to recall another result of this method, possibly a more important one. For reasons that are easily understood, the Life of St Paul of Thebes was received with scepticism by contemporaries; thisvexed St Jerome, but he did not trouble to combat

the view. The result of this strange silence was to perpetuate down , to our own time an opinion which was shared until lately by moderate critics. Since then, evidence independent of the legend, bringing St Antony’s contemporary Paul into the light of history, appears to have settled all doubts. There have been other examples, no less encouraging. If we are asked why we have not given more of them, and whether a special chapter on authentic Acts was not called for, the answer is easy.

In our opinion, it was desirable not to burden this book with a mass of details that were superfluous to it and would have upset its arrangement; instead, we did something better: we devoted two whole volumes to these special questions—the subject is as big

as all that. In Les origines du culte des martyrs (Brussels, 1912) texts are brought together which, better than the legends, prove the antiquity of the cultus of the more famous martyrs and of many others less well known. In Les Passions des martyrs et les genres

XVI THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS littéraires (Brussels, 1921) hagiographical documents of every kind

are analysed and valued, historical Acts having the first place. It would have been impossible to treat all these matters with the necessary detail in a few pages.

And, having just referred to literary genres, it may here be emphasized that most of the difficulties met in the study of hagiographical texts arise from forgetfulness of an elementary rule: the rule of not confusing the poet with the historian.

For it is poets that the common run of hagiographers must be called. We shall be told that this is to do them too much honour. Does is not profane a noble designation, one that is associated with some of the greatest works of the human mind, in which the deepest thoughts are clothed in magnificent images and lovely sounds? It is true that a few exceptional hagiographers, more talented than the rest and carried away by the grandeur of their subject, have, perhaps unconsciously, reached a high level of poetry, telling sublime stories in the unpolished language of their age. But it must be acknowledged that most hagiographers were hardly endowed with the lofty gifts which make a true poet, and if one decides to put them in such good company it 1s for want of a better way of marking the contrast between their work and that of the historians. Inspiration apart, hagiographers do just as poets do : they affect complete independence of, sometimes a lordly contempt for, historical facts; for real persons they substitute strongly-marked types; they borrow from anywhere in order to give colour to their narratives and to sustain interest; above all, they are ever mindful of the marvellous, so apt for heightening the effect of an edifying subject. Or they can be called painters, if you wish, and be accorded the

prerogatives which are granted to artists everywhere : Pictoribus atque poetis

quidlibet audendi semper fuit aequa potestas. Here is an old edition of the Aeneid; in accordance with the custom of his time, the printer has prefaced it with an engraving representing Virgil. You do not hesitate for a moment, do you, to to say that it is not a portrait ? And nobody will take you to task

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION XIX for so lightly deciding a question of likeness, which calls for a comparison between the original and the representation. You for your

part will not say that the man who wrote Virgil’s name under a fanciful picture is a swindler. The artist was following the fashion of his time, which allowed conventional portraits. Or take Leonardo da Vinci’s ‘““Last Supper”. Nobody will think

of saying that if the apostles returned to earth they would not recognize themselves in the painting, or their divine Master, or the supper-room or the table or anything else in it. We know perfectly

well that the idea of an archaeological reconstruction never entered the artist’s head. What he aimed at doing was to bring back to mind the poignant feelings of that tragic night when the Saviour said to his disciples, ““One of you is to betray me”: and how well he succeeded. But where is the exegete who would think of going to the painter for any elucidation whatever of the gospel account?

When we are faced with a written text we are liable to forget what would instinctively suggest itself were it a pictorial representation, and so it often happens that we look in the text for what the writer had no idea of putting there. May I here recall an already distant memory? One of the first

copies of The Legends of the Saints had a reception I was far from expecting. The friend who had received the complimentary copy informed me that he would put the book in his library, but that he would never read it. ‘““What do you expect?” he said, “I love the legends of the saints, and I do not want anything to spoil my pleasure in them.” That may be the psychology of more than one of my readers. If so, they should read no further. We do not wish to spoil anybody’s pleasure.

There is no question whatever of our waging war on legends. It would be a senseless thing to do. All the learned societies can join |

together and proclaim that St Lawrence could not have been tortured in the way that is said; but till the end of the world the gridiron will be the only recognized emblem of that famous Roman

deacon. The work of legend can be numbered amongst the great unconscious natural forces. It is impossible for the people’s mind to be strongly impressed by some great event or by some powerful

XX THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS personality without their feelings finding expression in stories in which popular fancy is given full play. To say that legend has flourished luxuriantly in the neighbourhood of shrines is simply to

underline the importance of the cultus of saints in the life of peoples. Legend is a homage that the Christian community pays to its patron saints. As such, one cannot ignore it. Only, do not

mistake it for history. Zeal for the glory of the saints does not require any such confusion of mind, and it presents serious disadvantages. Brussels

13 August 1927

THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS

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CHAPTER I

GENERAL IDEAS | Hagiographical documents. Imaginative narratives. Literary compositions. The romance. Creations of the people. The myth. The tale. The legend. The hagiographical legend; its two chief factors.

First oF all let us try to get clear what we mean by a hagiographical document.

The term should not be applied indiscriminately to any and every writing that bears on the saints. Tacitus’s vivid picture of | the sufferings of the earliest Roman martyrs is not a hagiographi-

cal document, any more than are those pages of Eusebius’s Ecclestastical History in which the victims of the great persecutions pass before our eyes in massed ranks, Eusebius wrote a pane-

gyric in four books of the first Christian emperor, who in the _ Eastern Orthodox Church is given the honours reserved to saints. Yet that Life of Constantine is not a life of a saint; whereas the same writer’s Martyrs of Palestine, written with the object of edi-

| fying the faithful by recounting the sufferings of those martyrs, is a hagiographical document; it is an historical document too, and one of the first order. From the point of view of hagiography, the same must be said of the Acts of St Theodore, though in the

form that we have them there is nothing historical about them. The calendars and martyrologies in which the martyrs’ anniversary days are recorded must be included in the same classification, but in a special category of it, and with them the formal inscriptions (such as those of Pope Damasus) engraved on their tombs. So we see that to be strictly hagiographical the document must be of a religious character and aim at edification. The term then must be confined to writings inspired by religious devotion to the saints and intended to increase that devotion.

The important thing to be emphasized at the outset is the 3

4 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS distinction between hagiography and history. The work of the hagiographer may be historical, but it is not necessarily so. It may take any literary form suited to honouring the saints, from an official record adapted to the needs of the faithful to a highly exuberant poem that has nothing whatever to do with factual reality.

Obviously no one would dare to maintain that hagiographers

always and everywhere observe the strict rules of historical writing. But how are their deviations to be gauged? ‘his is what has to be decided in each particular case. And before going any further in this matter we will try to clarify certain notions that are

less commonplace than they seem at first sight. |

Narratives that are not factually true are referred to as myths, fables, tales, romances, legends. These terms are taken in a wide sense and often used synonymously. ‘This may lead to all sorts of confusion, which we will try to avoid by means of more careful

definitions.’ ,

We need say but little about fable. In its widest sense the word designates any imaginative story; in a more exact sense it is the equivalent of apologue or allegory, especially when the characters in the story are represented by animals. Not that hagiographers have wholly disdained this imaginative form. The writer of the Life of SS. Barlaam and Joasaph included several apologues in his compilation; these have been the object of particular studies.” But they are exceptions, and in general hagiographical criticism does not have to concern itself with imitators of Aesop or La Fontaine. Myth, tale, legend and romance all belong to the class of imagi-

native story, but may be divided into two categories: there are those that are the spontaneous impersonal expression of a people’s

genius or native disposition, and those that are the product of deliberate literary artifice. In the usual sense of the word, a romance belongs to the second category. The author chooses and ponders his subject, and brings

his abilities and imagination to bear on the work of art he has conceived, Jf his theme is the character and doings of an historical

GENERAL IDEAS J person, or the events of an historical period, the result is an historical romance or novel. If the characters and events in the work are wholly fictitious, it will be an imaginative romance. If the writer’s

aim is to depict the life and spirit of a saint honoured by the Church by means of a series of happenings that are partly real and

partly imaginary, then the work may be called a hagiographical romance, though that expression has not passed into common use.

Romances of this last kind are very numerous, and some of them go back to very early times :* for example, the Acts of Paul and Thecla, and that collection of apocryphal Acts of the Apostles

which had so long and remarkable a vogue. And there are the Clementine romances (Homilies and Recognitions),* of which a summary for long formed part of the best-known hagiographical collections.

The tale and the legend cannot strictly speaking be included in the family of artificial compositions. It is true that short works of fiction are often called tales, and the writer at his desk sometimes sets out to produce a story in a form that recalls the legend or tale properly so called. Such sophisticated imitations have just to be mentioned here, but there is no need to dwell on them. Our concern is with those works of fiction which are without individual

character, the anonymous product of that abstraction which 1s

called a people’s genius. | And first, the myth. This term is often applied to anything which has no real existence, and the hero who never lived outside a poet’s imagination is called a mythical personage. That is not the word’s proper sense; Joad’s confidant, Abner, in Athalie, isa

pure invention of Racine, but it is wrong to classify Abner and similar characters as “mythical beings”’.

The essence of myth is the personification of a power or of an abstract idea, or, if it be preferred, a myth is simply the explanation of a natural phenomenon as it presents itself to a people in a primitive stage of development.** Whether we choose to regard myths as poetical symbols, or whether, as has been ingeniously suggested, we look on mythology as the treatise on physics of primi-

tive times, it is certain that natural phenomena are the proper

6 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS subject of myth. Sun, moon, stars, lightning, day and night, the changing seasons, all are represented by gods and heroes and the adventures attributed to them. Rosy-fingered Dawn opening the doors of the East, Phaethon driving the chariot of the sun, a dozen other charming fables with which the study of antiquity has made us familiar—these are myths.

I do not want to multiply examples, for before classifying a narrative it is needful to make up one’s mind about its real meaning, and were we to follow a certain school there would be very few fictional items that could not be included under the heading of mythology. A cantankerous critic has said that there are people who cannot see a cat and dog fight without beginning to chatter

about the conflict between light and darkness. This quip was aimed at extravagances that are only too real, and we shall take care not to use the word myth without a good reason.

Are there such things as hagiographical myths? Have hagiographers at any rate made use of mythical elements? I see no difficulty in admitting it, and I shall show that more than one element belonging to ancient mythology has been carried over to saints.

The tale, properly speaking, is an invented story that is not associated with any real person or real place. “Once upon a time there were a king and a queen who had a very beautiful daughter ...” This classical beginning by the teller®™ characterizes the kind

of story exactly, one in which everything is subordinate to the plot, which is meant solely for the pleasure of the hearer or, in the case of a moral tale, to bring out some practical truth. It might be supposed that there is an endless variety of popular tales, but this is not so. They can all be brought under one or other of a certain number of types, of which not one seems to belong

exclusively to a particular people or even to a race: they are a common heritage of mankind.

A great deal has been written about the origin of these tales.’ Without going into details of the theories put forward by experts, we may mention two principal ones which have been well received

and can he considered extreme solutions. Some scholars explain

GENERAL IDEAS 7 the repetition of identical themes and the similarity of their forms by the sameness of the human mind. Others prefer a less simple

and less metaphysical solution, one which corresponds more closely to observed facts. According to them, India is the one and

only cradle of the popular tales which are found all over the world;** whatever one may like to assume about their original authors, the stories spread from India and became common property on as wide a scale as can be imagined. There is no need for us to attempt to decide the question here. It is enough to remember that, like seeds carried by wind across the ocean, they are for ever floating in the air and are found in all lands, without ever being definitively associated with a name or a place. A legend, on the other hand, has of necessity an historical or topographical connexion. It refers imaginary events to a real per-

son, associates fanciful stories with an existing place. Thus we speak of the legend of Alexander or of Julius Caesar, the legend of Drachenfels castle on the Rhine or of the Red Lake, Lough Derg, in Ireland. Such, in accordance with approved usage, is the strict meaning of our terms. But it must be added that in practice the differences are less clear and classification less easy. As it flies from one people to another, one of our winged stories may settle for a moment on some famous building, or the nameless being who is its hero may be given a name of historical significance. Thus the tale is turned into a legend, which misleads you unless you come across some other version of the same story that shows the historical element to

be a purely accidental accretion.** In the same way a myth can easily take on the appearance of a legend.

Or again, if you take away from a legend the elements that tie it to reality, you make it look like a simple tale. This accounts for the difficulty of disentangling legend and tale in the famous collection of the Thousand and One Nights (“The Arabian Nights”), for in spite of their highly fanciful character parts of these stories appear to have an historical basis.*® Contrariwise, it can happen that a seemingly clear example of legend suddenly turns up in the _ form of a folk tale, It was a long time before it was recognized

8 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS that the legend of St Dympna”™ is an adaptation of the wellknown tale of the donkey’s skin, or that the theme of the moving story of Genevieve of Brabant had already been used by the epic poets of India.***

So we see that a legend, considered as a connected narrative and as distinct from a myth or a tale, presupposes an historical fact which is its subject or occasion : that is the first essential ele-

ment of this genre. The second is that the historical fact is embroidered or distorted by popular imagination. The two elements may be combined in very unequal proportions, and according as fact or fiction preponderates the narrative can be classed as history or as legend.

As it is the fictional element that determines the category of legend, it has quite naturally come about that the same name 1s applied to the fictional element itself, and so we find the term “legend”? extended to every unconscious distortion of historical truth, whether a single or several matters be in question. It can hardly be necessary to emphasize the considerable part played by legend (in all its meanings) in writings about the saints,

a form of literature that 1s eminently of the people both in its origins and its aims. The very word has been borrowed from hagiography. Originally, the legend was the account of a saint to be read, legenda, on his feast-day, the passion of a martyr or the eulogy of a confessor, without reference to its worth as history.

‘‘Legendarius vocatur liber ille ubi agitur de vita et obitu con-

fessorum, qui legitur in eorum festis, martyrum autem in passionariis’, wrote the twelfth-century liturgist John Beleth;*** he distinguishes between “passions” and “legends”, contrary to the usage that soon prevailed, for from the thirteenth century the Legenda Aurea confirmed the wider meaning which includes in legends the acts of martyrs as well as the biographies of other saints. We could, then, conform with the old usage and give the name legend to all hagiographical narratives, including even those that have a recognized value as historical documents. But to do so would lead to confusion, and we will wholly refrain from it in the

GENERAL IDEAS 9 pages that follow; the word legend will be used only for a narrative or feature that is not historical.

Hagiographical literature has been formed under the influence of two quite distinct factors, which indeed are to be found when tracing back any literary stream. There is that anonymous creator called the people or, taking effect for cause, the legend : a hidden, collective worker, uncontrolled in his ways, quick and disorderly as the human imagination itself, always bringing forth something new, but not able to make it permanent by writing it down. By his side there is the scholar, the editor, whom we see burdened by a laborious task, compelled to follow a direction laid down for him,

ended. ,

imprinting a stamp of reflection and lastingness on all that he produces. Together they have laboured at that huge work called The Lives of the Saints, and it is important that we should recognize the part taken by each in this undertaking, ages old but never

We intend to confine ourselves almost wholly to the religious literature of the middle ages, seeking out how it was elaborated by the people on the one hand and by the hagiographers on the other. Some readers may think that the methods of both sides have not yet gone completely out of fashion. We shall not disagree with that opinion.

LO THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS NOTES ON CHAPTER I 1The following are the titles of some relevant works; we give them without discussing the conclusions of their authors, who do not always agree with one another. J. F. L. George, Mythus and Sage (Berlin, 1837); J. Fiske, Myths and Myth-makers (London, 1873); H. Steinthal, “Mythos,

Sage, Marchen, Legende, Erzahlung, Fabel”, in Zeitschrift fiir Volkerbsychologie und Sprachwissenschaft, vol xvii (1865), pp. 113-39; E. Bernheim, Lehrbuch der historischen Methode, 3rd edn (Leipzig, 1903) pp. 317, 349, 457-68; E. Siecke, Mythologische Briefe (Berlin, 1901); E. Betha, “Mythus, Sage, Marchen”, in Hessische Blatter fiir Volkskunde, vol. iv (1905), pp. 97-142); F. Lanzoni, Genest, svolgimento e tramonto delle leggende storiche (Rome, 1925; Studi e Testi, 43). 2S. J. Warren, De Grieksche christelijke roman Barlaam en Joasaf en zujne parabels (Rotterdam, 1899).

_ 8There is an interesting account in E. von Dobschitz “Der Roman in der altchristlichen Literatur”, in Deutsche Rundschau, April 1902, pp. 87-106.

4H. U. Mayboom, De Clemens-Roman, 2 vols (Groningen, 1904). On this work and other Clementine studies, see Analacta Bollandiana, vol. Xxl1v, pp. 138-41

5In the Revue critique of 3 June 1905, p. 425, S. Reinach questioned this definition of a myth. “A myth”, he wrote, “is essentially a story which

mankind has believed to be true at a particular stage of its intellectual development”. This seems to us too vague to use as a definition. Reinach may be right when he goes on, “To attempt, as the author has done, to distinguish rigorously between myth and legend is to require of the words

a precision which they have not got’. The definition we have adopted is on the whole the one most commonly used by specialists, so we may perhaps be allowed to keep to it for the avoidance of confusion. 6This is almost word for word how Apuleius begins Cupid and Psyche: “Erant in quadam civitate rex et regina. Hi tres numero filias forma conspicuas habuere” (Met. iv, 28).

7E. Cosquin, Contes populaires de Lorraine, vol. 1 (Paris, 1886), pp. 1 —Ixvu; L’origine des contes populatres européens et les théories de M.

(Andrew) Lang (Paris, 1891); Quelques observations sur les “Inctdents communs aux contes orientaux” (London, 1892); Etudes folkloriques: Recherches sur les migrations des contes populaires et leur point

de départ (Paris, 1922); Les contes indiens et ’Occident (Paris, 1922). Cosquin was a decided supporter of the Eastern theory, which has been opposed notably by J. Bédier, Les Fabliaux (Bibliothéque de l’Ecole des Hautes Etudes, fasc. 98, Paris, 1893), pp. 45-250. For other systems and their variations, see C. Martens, “L’origine des contes populaires”, in Revue néoscolastique, vol. i (1894), pp. 234-262, 352-384; G. Huet, Les contes populaires (Paris, 1923).

NOTES ON CHAPTER I 11 8Among holders of the Eastern theory there are some who look on Egypt

as the birthplace of popular tales. See, for instance, S. Reinach in the Revue d’histotre et de littérature religieuses, vol. ix (1904), pp. 319-320.

It does not seem to us to be proved, but we cannot discuss the subject here.

9Sometimes it is quite easy to see through the disguises of persons, as in those stories in which Jesus Christ and St Peter appear. Here, for example, is a legend from the Basque country, recorded by Cerquand: “Christ and St Peter were out walking one day, when they came upon a man on his knees in the middle of the road; he was calling on God to get his cart out of the ditch into which it had fallen. As Jesus went on without taking any notice, Peter said to him, ‘Lord, won’t you help this poor man?’ And Jesus

replied, ‘He does not deserve our help, because he is not trying to help himself.’ A little further on they came upon another man in the same plight

but doing his best, shouting and cursing the while. Jesus hurried to his assistance, saying, “This one deserves our help, for he is doing what he can.’ ”’ Everyone knows this anecdote, told by the fabulist about Hercules. See R. Kohler, Kleine Schriften, vol. ii (Berlin, 1900), pp. 102-4; cf. the excellent apologue, “Why men no longer know when they are going to die”, ibid., pp. 100-2.

10M. J. de Goeje, “De arabische Nachtvertellingen”, in De Gtds, vol. tii (1886), pp. 385-413. 114A cta Sanctorum, May, vol. iii, pp. 479-486.

12Qn the variations and derivatives of this story, see H. Suchier, Gewvres

poétiques de Beaumanoir (Société des anciens textes frangais, vol. 1, 1884), pp. xxv-lxxxi, clx. Neither Genevieve of Brabant nor Mary of Brabant (whose story is identical) has been an object of ecclesiastical cultus. Acta SS, Jan., vol. 11, p. 180; April, vol. i, p. 57.

13°°A book which relates the life and death of confessors, to be read on their feasts, is called a Legendary; in the case of martyrs it is a Passionary” (De divinis officits, 60, in P. L., vol. ccii, p. 66). Cf. E. von Dobschiitz, art. “Legende”’, in Realencyklopaedie fiir protestantische Theologie, 3rd edn, vol. x1, p. 345.

CHAPTER II

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 1—Unconscious distortion of truth by the individual, —by the people. Low level of general understanding. Tendency to simplify. Lack of knowledge. Substitution of the abstract form for the individual type. Poverty of invention. Borrowing and spread of legendary themes. Examples. Great age of some themes. Artificial grouping of persons and happenings. Cycles.

THE PRODUCTION of legend is by definition the result of uncon-

scious or unconsidered action working on historical material, the introduction of a subjective element into the realm of fact. Suppose that on the day after a battle you were to collect eyewitnesses’ accounts of it. The engagement would be described in a score of different ways, the same details related from very varying points of view, and all with the same appearance of truthfulness. Each account would be affected by the extent of the narrator’s information, his impressions and feelings, the side he was on; his story would be neither wholly true nor wholly false. Each one would tell you his own legend. ‘The combined result of these varying accounts would be a legend too, and if you tried to extract the

pure historical truth from it you would have to be satisfied with two or three salient facts that seemed to be established with certainty. Were you to fill in the gaps by a series of deductions, you would be making your own history of the battle, in fact creating a new legend; and you would have to be content with that, or else resign yourself to ignorance.

Everyone realizes the peculiar difficulty of giving an exact account of an event that is too complex to be taken in at a glance. But it does not follow that, these exceptional cases apart, it is quite easy and common to describe something faithfully. The truth is that in our daily life we are continually taking part in the uncon-

scious process that produces legends; every one of us has had occasion scores of times to notice how difficult it is to recount our 12

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 13 observation of something with complete exactness, even if it be only slightly complex.

To begin with, we do not usually grasp a happening in all its details or see the connexion between all its parts; still more rarely do we clearly perceive the causes that are at work, in such a way as to leave no doubt about the motives of the persons concerned. And we instinctively fill the gaps. We reconstruct the continuity of what happened by means of a series of intuitive links, and impose our way of seeing things on the factors that produced this or

that result. If we are under the influence of some emotion or opinion that has obscured the clear sight of things, if in our heart we want something that happened not to have happened or not to be known, or that something we did not notice should really have happened, if it suits us that people concerned should have been moved by some particular impulse, why then, almost without thinking about it, we leave one part of the picture in the background or heighten the effect of another part, according to our own requirements. So, unless we strictly control our mental processes and discipline our impressions, we are liable to inject a large subjective element into our account of things, and truth will suffer. To give exact expression to a complex reality calls for sound and practised abilities and considerable effort, and consequently for a stimulus proportioned to the end in view. It will be agreed that, ordinarily speaking, the average man has

not got the mental energy required for this purpose. It is the privilege of only a few to be in the habit of analysing their thoughts

and feelings and controlling the least impulses of their hearts, to

such a degree that they are always on their guard against that natural tendency to mix up what we imagine with what we know. Even those whose natural gifts and education are well above the average do not invariably bring these advantages into play.

Suppose yourself to have been the eye-witness of a criminal killing. In talking to your friends, you describe the horrifying things that you saw in the smallest detail, nothing about the murderer and his victim seems to have escaped your notice. But then you are called as a witness at the assizes; a man’s life depends on 2

14 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS your evidence, given under oath. What a difference between the two versions of the same story! Your description is much less clear

and full, and has lost the exciting quality you gave to it in private. The reason is that in the serious circumstances of a trial one is much more careful to be exact, and is no longer inclined to give way to the trifling vanity of appearing as a well-informed

and interesting person; for the most truthful and honest man may unconsciously start little legends by bringing his own impressions, ideas and feelings into what he reports, thus presenting the

truth in a form which, according to the circumstances, is either embellished or distorted.

It need hardly be pointed out that opportunities for error increase in number with the number of intermediaries through whom a story passes. Each one understands it in a certain way and

repeats it in his own way. Through not listening properly or through forgetfulness, someone fails to mention an important cir-

cumstance and the coherence of the story is thereby impaired. Somebody else, more careful, notices something is missing, and uses his imagination to try and repair the omission; he invents a new detail here, and suppresses another there, till the require-

ments of likelihood and logic appear to him to be satisfied. This is generally achieved at the expense of truth, the speaker or

writer not realizing that he has substituted a quite different story for the primitive version. Sometimes again a story is trans-

mitted through someone who finds it embarrassing, and he contributes seriously to its falsification by some twist of thought or expression. This sort of thing is happening every day. Whether we are eyewitnesses or intermediaries, our shallow understanding, our carelessness, our emotions and, perhaps above all, our petty prejudices conspire together against the accuracy of a story when we make it our business to repeat one. This commonplace process becomes much more interesting and

fraught with consequences when it takes place on a large scale, when for the understanding and impressions of individuals there are substituted the understanding and impressions of a crowd or of

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 1d a whole people. These collective and, in a sense, abstract faculties

are of a very special kind, their activities governed by laws that have been much studied in recent times as a special department of psychology.’ The laws that have been formulated are verified by thousands of examples taken from the popular literature of all lands, and hagiographical writings provide a large number that

confirm them. |

We will not complicate the subject by trying to decide the re-

spective degrees of capacity shown at different social levels. Nothing is more difficult to do, and as regards the matters that concern us here the most diverse elements have to be considered. In the middle ages the whole people were interested in the saints; everybody invoked them, kept their feasts and loved to hear their praises sung. Their legends were developed within a society that was a very mixed one, and it did not lack some persons with cer-

tain literary pretensions—I hasten to add that this was of no benefit to the saints.

The intellectual capacity of people at large is manifestly very limited everywhere, and it would be a mistake to suppose that in general it is improved through the influence of the more gifted. On the contrary, it is the élite which is acted on by the others, and there would be little logic in attributing special value to a popular tradition because it had grown up in a society that was not without intelligent and able members. In any crowd the better elements are swamped, and the average of intelligence is well below middling; its level can best be gauged by comparing it with the intelligence of a child.

What it comes to is that the generality of human minds can take in only a very few ideas, and those of the simplest. Its deduc- __ tions are equally simple, made through a few intuitive principles,

and they are often no more than mere associations of ideas or images. The exceeding simplicity of the general mind and disposition 1s clearly shown in the legends it creates. For instance, the number of

people and events it remembers 1s usually very limited; and its heroes do not live in memory side by side but replace one another,

16 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS the latest comer inheriting all the qualities and achievements of his predecessors.

Antiquity has bequeathed to us outstanding examples of such ‘absorption’. The wars of many centuries are concentrated beneath the walls of Troy; a prolonged evolution of law-making in Athens and Sparta is put to the credit of Solon and Lycurgus.”* In later ages it is Alexander, Julius Caesar, Charlemagne’ who, according to the country, haunt the people’s imagination, and honour after honour is heaped on the head of the chosen hero. He it is who was responsible for every striking achievement, the country’s welfare and prosperity is due to him, his name is associ-

ated with everything noteworthy in the land. Some old legends would have us believe that in all Alexandria there was not a stone that had not been put there by Alexander himself.* From the day that Tiberius made Capri the scene of his debaucheries he became as it were the tutelary spirit of the place, whose generous hand has left its mark all over the island.° It is obvious that this habit of concentrating all the glories of the past in a single person seriously alters his real proportions. ‘The glory of his apotheosis is sometimes such that the hero loses his true

appearance in it and emerges completely disguised. Virgil, for example, when he became the hero of the Neapolitans, ceased to be the inspired poet and was transformed into the city governor.°® The local tradition of Sulmona has made Ovid everything that in

fact he was not: a skilful wizard, a captain of commerce, a prophet, a preacher, a sort of paladin, yes, and—would you believe

it >—a great saint.’ ,

Historical truth does not come into the picture, since it is taken for granted of the really popular hero that he is concerned in all important events : the great man has wholly captured the people’s imagination, and nothing that 1s fine, striking or advantageous can

happen without his having a hand in it. In the religious sphere, this great man is the saint who is specially revered in the place concerned. Here it is St Martin’s name that crops up at every step; there it is St Patrick’s.* Popular enthusiasm exaggerates the scope of the hero’s activities, making it include a mass of things

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 17 pulled out of their historical setting, or he is credited with achievements of his superseded predecessors. Above all, it is useless to expect the multitude to distinguish be-

tween persons of the same name. Great men are so uncommon! What chance is there that there should be two of the same name? It is reasoning of this kind that has convinced the inhabitants of Calabria that, returning from the First Crusade, St Louis stayed in several of their towns; whereas in fact he never set foot in the neighbourhood. The King Louis who marched through the Neapolitan provinces with the remnants of a crusading army was Louis VII. When the holiness of Louis IX had put the renown of all his predecessors in the shade, it was quite natural that he should

take the place of the other Louis in people’s minds’ In the same way did Alexander the Great and Charlemagne absorb all their namesakes.*°*

This shows us that people at large are not, as we are, bothered by chronology. They were not startled to hear it read out, for instance, that St Austremonius was sent to Auvergne by St Clement in the reign of the emperor Decius.** It seemed all right to them

that there should have been dukes and counts during the same reign; and why should they have suspected that it was an anachronism to give the title of archdeacon to St Stephen and St Lawrence, who were certainly not deacons as that office was understood later?

Neither was geography any difficulty, and distances did not exist. No eyebrow was raised at stories which confused Caesarea Philippi with Caesarea in Palestine,” or spoke of a war between

the last named city and Carthage.” The caravan of seventy camels sent into the desert by the prefect of Périgueux, Isquirinus, to relieve the seventy monks dying of hunger there, did not seem to the hearers any the less interesting because the desert was situated on the banks of the river Dordogne.** No doubt they would be more critical about the topography of their own neighbourhood,

for there the facts were right under their eyes; but why trouble about places that are farther off ?*° Popular understanding of history is no less unsophisticated. For

18 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS example, its idea of the persecutions under the Roman empire. No distinction is made between the emperors who ordered or those who allowed proceedings against Christians; there is but one epithet for them, they are all impitssimus, whether it be Nero, Decius or Diocletian, Trajan, Marcus Aurelius or Alexander Severus. All

are equally inspired by the same insane hatred of Christianity, none has any concern but to destroy it. Often it is the emperor in person who presides at the trial of Christians, involving long journeys for himself which history does not record—and for good reason. It was obvious that the head of state could not be everywhere at once, but that is no obstacle to his rage; he is worthily represented by emissaries, who scour the whole empire. Christians are outlawed everywhere, searched out and dragged before ferocious judges, who contrive to invent frightful tortures, that in fact were never inflicted on even the worst criminals. The intervention from on high which prevents these ingenious torments from harming the martyrs throws their persecutors’ cruelty into higher relief, and at the same time provides an adequate and perceptible explanation of the numerous conversions which atrocious cruelty could do nothing to stop.*®

That is a miniature sketch of the persecutions as seen in popular legend. Variations in legislation and in enforcement of the laws, the very marked individuality of the great enemies of Christianity, the local character of some outbreaks in which Christians suffered,

such things do not touch the mind of the people at all; they would much rather have a simple picture that is brightly coloured

and strongly drawn than a product of all these complicated factors.

Need we add that for them there is no such thing as historical sequence? They do not notice if a martyr’s passion is dated indifferently to the reign of the wicked Decius or Numerian or Diocle-

tian.*"* They do not care about the judge’s name, and are not puzzled about how the cruel Dacianus could have been at work in both Spain and Italy at the same time. They are not familiar with

the long roll of popes, and the part played by a Pope Cyriacus

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 19 does not arouse suspicion of the legend of the eleven thousand virgins,» any more than they are surprised at the mention of a Pope Alexander in that of St Quen (Audoenus).*”* Thus historical persons are deprived of their individuality, re-

moved from their proper surroundings, and in a way isolated in time and space, so that their image in people’s minds is an incongruous and unreal one. An idealized figure takes the place of history’s sharply defined and living portrait, and this figure is no more

than the personification of an abstraction: instead of an indivi-

dual, the people see only a type. Alexander personifies the conqueror; Julius Caesar, the organizational genius of the Roman people; Constantine stands for the Empire regenerated by Christianity. In truly popular hagiographical legends it is not St Lawrence who is portrayed, but the typical figure of a martyr; later on, St

Martin becomes the typical missionary bishop and worker of miracles. There is the typical persecutor too, Diocletian in particular, and certain judges are as it were incarnations of the cruelty of heathen magistrates. One of the most famous is the formidable Anullinus, who in reality was proconsul of Africa during the great persecution. His name has become a synonym for a slayer of martyrs, and many are the legends that call on him to have Christians

put to death, at Lucca, Milan, Ancona, in the days of Nero, Valerian, Gallienus, Maximian, to say nothing of the accounts of what he was really responsible for.”°

It is not surprising that the reading of some hagiographical documents is a monotonous business, and that there are striking likenesses to be found between the acts of many different martyrs. Historical documents, such as the acts of St Polycarp, of SS. Perpetua and Felicity or of St Cyprian, display notable variations on

the one theme; but legends of the martyrs are always repeating themselves, for they have almost wholly got rid of the personal element and only an abstract figure is left. Generally speaking, the martyr is everywhere inspired in the same way, voices the same thoughts, undergoes the same ordeals; the holy confessor whose good life has brought him to Heaven must have had all the virtues

20 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS befitting his state of life, and the hagiographer, faithfully echoing popular tradition, loves to catalogue them.

Look at this portrait of St Fursey: “Erat enim forma praecipuus, corpore castus, mente devotus, affabilis colloquio, amabilis adspectu, prudentia praeditus, temperantia clarus, interna fortitu-

dine firmus, censura iustitiae stabilis, longanimitate assiduus, patientia robustus, humilitate mansuetus, caritate sollicitus, et ita in €O Omnium virtutum decorem sapientia adornabat, ut secundum apostolum sermo illius semper in gratiae sale esset conditus’’.”* That is indeed a fine panegyric; but could not the same be said of every saint?

The biographer of St Aldegund describes her thus: “Erat namque moribus honesta, eloquio suavis, in pauperibus misericors, in lectione velox, in responsis citissima, mitis omnibus, inter nobiles humilis, iunioribus quasi aequalis, in parcitate cibi et potus ita dedita abstinentiae ut nulla sodalium sibi aequipararetur’’.?”* A few facts illustrating how these virtues were manifested would

be far more impressive than this conventional picture. But the people have only a simple, generalized idea of holiness, and the hagiographer is its interpreter. You ask for a living portrait, and he gives you a programme. What is more, there is very little variety in this programme, for poverty of invention is another characteristic of the popular mind; it always develops along the same lines, and its combinations and permutations show little of interest. ‘The creative faculties seem doomed to barrenness directly people have got a few themes that are sufficient in interest and number to be adaptable to most situa-

tions. The comparative study of folk tales has shown that the same stories recur among all peoples and in all lands, that they can be reduced to a small number of subjects that are the same everywhere, and that they appear to have spread over the world from a common stock. In our day, as we all know, famous sayings are constantly coming out in “new editions” under fresh labels, an amusing anecdote is pinned now on this person, then on that;”* a classic example is

the absent-minded man of legend, whose misfortunes are always

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 21 the same: what town or village is without a local specimen? Ancient writers provide any number of examples of the passing on of legendary themes. We have only to read over the old historians’ accounts of well-known military sieges to find that the results of famine, the steadfastness of the besieged, and their tricks to hide their bad state from the enemy are nearly always reported in the same way. When the Gauls laid siege to Rome, soldiers were re-

duced to soaking leather from their shields and sandals in water

to try and extract a little nourishment in this way. If we may believe Livy, the same thing happened at the siege of Casilinum during the second Punic war, and also at the siege of Jerusalem, on the evidence of Josephus. During the same siege of Rome, women cut off their hair to twist it into ropes; the women of Carthage, Salona, Byzantium, Aquileia, Thasos, and yet other cities** made this sacrifice too (it may well be called heroic, seeing that contemporary fashion in hairdressing did not require it). Medieval chronicles also are full of ingenious dodges whose aim was to hood-

wink the enemy, who are duly taken in and raise the siege.”™* It is sufficient to put these curious stories side by side with others of the same kind to see how much they are worth as history. Examples could be varied indefinitely, and strange cases adduced of bizarre legends becoming naturalized in the most disparate places. Who would believe that the Irish had thought fit to borrow his donkey’s ears from King Midas** and to bestow them on at least two of their own kings ??" A systematic classification of legendary motifs supplied by hagio-

graphical documents would lead to similar conclusions. Many of the striking episodes that an inexperienced reader takes for original contributions are simply reminiscences, wandering features that have got attached now to one saint, now to another. The crucifix which miraculously appears to St Hubert?® between the antlers of a stag is not peculiar to his legend. It is also found in those of St Meinulf*®? and of St Eustace,®° without speaking of many others wherein differences of detail make the incident less plainly recognizable. Lists have been made of saints

who overcame a dragon,** but they all need to be made more

22 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS complete before one could hope to exhaust the subject in some degree. But I do not see any point in doing so. It is nearly always a waste of time to try and find the historical fact which lies behind the introduction of this epic incident into a saint’s life: one might just as well ask why a seed carried by the wind has fallen on this spot here rather than that one there. A critic has rightly expressed distrust of a detail in the acts of SS. Sergius and Bacchus.*” The body of the second martyr, having been thrown onto the public highway, is protected from marauding dogs by birds of prey.** The bodies of St Vincent,** St Vitus,*° St Florian®* and St Stanislaus of Cracow*’ are protected in the

same remarkable way; and we must not forget the eagle which Solomon summoned to guard the body of David, and other parallels in Talmudic writings.** Talking of eagles, it is to be remembered that the miraculous bird who spread its wings to shield St Servatius,*® St Bertulf,*° St Medard*’ and others from sun and rain is also met in other than hagiographical contexts.

In the Life of St Elizabeth of Hungary we read that her husband, when leaving to go on a crusade, gave her a ring whose stone

had the property of breaking when any harm befell the donor. This legend, probably introduced into the story because of some historic happening, is found in a slightly different form in the life of St Honorius of Buzangais. It is a popular feature which has not

only been used in the romance of Flores and Blanchefleur, but also in the Thousand and One Nights, in a Kalmuk tale and in more than one Indian tale.* The dramatic adventure of St Elizabeth of Portugal’s page is a Christian adaptation of a story that originated in India;** and according to some scholars the story of St Francis Xavier’s crucifix, which fell into the sea and was recovered by a crab, is derived from Japanese mythology.**

At Valencia in Spain there is kept in Saint Saviour’s church an image of Christ which arrived there miraculously by sea, floating against the tide. At Santa Maria del Grao, the port of Valencia, there is another image of Christ, together with the ladder used at his crucifixion; these also came there by sea, in a ship empty alike

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 23 of crew and freight. The vessel stopped in mid-stream, and the inhabitants on either shore began to quarrel about who should have these holy relics. To settle the dispute, the ship was towed out to the open sea and there set adrift to go where it would; it at once

returned to the river and took up its station near the Santa Maria bank.*°

Pausanias gives a similar account of the coming of the statue of Hercules to Erythrae. It arrived from Tyre on a raft and stopped at the headland of Juno, called Cape Mesata because it is halfway between Erythrae and Khios. As soon as they saw the god,

the inhabitants of each town did all they could to ensure possession of it; but the heavens decided in favour of Erythrae. A fisherman from there, named Phormio, was told in a dream that if the women made a tow-rope of their hair they would be able easily to pull the raft; accordingly the Thracian women living in the town sacrificed their locks, and thus won the miraculous statue for Erythrae.*° The two legends are identical except for the final details.

There is no theme more hackneyed in popular hagiography than the miraculous arrival of the image or the body of a saint in a derelict vessel; nor anything more commonplace than the miraculous stopping of a ship, or the refusal of draught oxen to go on, in order to indicate the place mysteriously predestined to be the home

of some sacred treasure or to confirm a church in the lawful ownership of a saint’s relics.*** ‘Think of the arrival of St James in

| Spain, of St Lubentius at Dietkirchen, of St Maternus at Rodenkirchen, of St Emmeramus at Regensburg, of our Lady’s girdle at Prato, of the Volto Santo at Lucca.*®

Research has shown that the miraculous travels of crucifixes,

madonnas and images of saints are particularly numerous in Sicily.*? Similar inquiries elsewhere would probably result in as many discoveries in other countries.”” In Istria an occurrence of the same kind is associated with Constantine’s foundation of the see of Pedena.”* The panegyrist of St Theodore of Sykeon attributed power of speech to an animal in order to declare the saint’s express approval of the resting-place chosen for him.” The oxen

bringing St Cyril of Gortyna to execution stopped at the right

24 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS place in consequence of a command from on high,”* and then there is the part played by camels in the story of St Menas the Egyptian.°***

There would be no end to a list of the commonplaces of hagiography. The examples we have given show that some of them are very old indeed, and that is a point that cannot be emphasized too much. Many of the legendary motifs found all over the place in the Lives of the saints, in accounts of the foundation of famous shrines and in stories about the origin of some miraculous images, already occur in the classics of antiquity. ‘The ancients themselves would have been hard put to it to tell us where they came from; for them, as for us, they were leaves floating in the air, brought by the wind from afar.

The picture or letter dropped from heaven, the akheiropotetos or image not made by human hands, is not an invention of Christian story-tellers. The legend of the Palladium of Troy, the statue of Pallas Athene that fell from the sky and many similar legends show how familiar these ideas were to the men of old. Like ourselves, they knew of sacred images which shed tears,” of statues exuding sweat in calamitous times,°” of voices speaking from marble lips.*°

The Lives of St Ambrose of Cahors, St Maurilius,°? St Maglorius,*’ St Kentigern™ and others tell us of objects lost in the sea and recovered from a fish’s belly; it is only a reminiscence of Polycrates’ ring, a story known to Herodotus.” The bees that swarmed

in the cradle of St Ambrose,” and also visited St Isidore,** had long ago deposited their honey in the mouths of Pindar® and of Plato.®* The rock opening to receive St Thecla®’ and St Ariadne®

to shelter them from their pursuers is an echo of the fable of Daphne, just as the story of St Barbara recalls that of Danae, whose father shut her up 1n a brazen tower.” Suetonius relates how, once when he was still a boy, Augustus

silenced the frogs that were croaking round his grandfather’s country house, and he adds that it is said that since then the frogs there have always been silent.” ‘This same marvel has been credited to more than one saint: St Rieul (Regulus) of Senlis, St Antony

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 20 of Padua, St Benno of Meissen, St George of Suelli, St Quen, St

Harvey (Herveus), St James of the March, St Segnorina, St Ulphia.“* It will be remembered with what vigour, at the beginning of his Life of St Paul [the Hermit], St Jerome describes the horrors of the persecution under Decius and Valerian: the martyr smeared with honey and exposed to the biting of insects, and that other one who bit out his tongue and spat it in the face of a woman sent to seduce him from virtue.” The charm and vividness of Jerome’s writing give these stories an appearance of authenticity which they can hardly claim. Torture by insects appears to be a reminiscence deriving from Apuleius’ or some such writer;’* while the biting out of the tongue was related several times by the ancients, and attributed variously to the Pythagorean Timycha, to the harlot Leaena and to the philosopher Zeno of Elea." In recording this Christian adaptation of an ancient legend, St Jerome did not ensure its final attribution; it was later told of the martyr Nicetas,”° and Nicephorus Callistus told it yet again, this time of an ascetic who lived in the time of Diocletian.”

It is hardly necessary to recall the story of the Seven Sleepers. The theme of a long sleep is already found in the legend of Epimenides, and it has gone on being used in folk tales under numberless forms.“ The apparent complexity of certain legends, and the unlooked-

for impression made by certain apparently very well contrived arrangements of material, must not deceive us into drawing hasty conclusions in favour of the creative ability of the people’s genius. Historical elements which cannot be easily simplified are merely juxtaposed, and held together by threads that are usually of the flimsiest. The resulting narratives are often incoherent and nearly always extremely unconvincing.

But the general effect is not always lacking in grandeur and impressiveness. Here, for instance, is one version of the legend of the wood of Christ’s cross. When Adam was driven from paradise he took with him a branch from the tree of knowledge, and used it as a staff till the end of his days. This staff passed from hand to

26 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS hand to the patriarchs, and during the wars an angel hid it ina cave, where it was found by Jethro when herding his flocks. In his _ old age Jethro sent to Moses to come and fetch the staff, which at Moses’ approach miraculously sprang towards him. This was the

staff on which Moses set up the brazen serpent. Later on it belonged to Phineas, who hid it in a waste place; and at the time of Christ’s birth the exact spot was revealed to St Joseph, who recovered the staff at the time of the flight into Egypt. He handed it on to his son Jacob, who in turn gave it to Judas, the betrayer, and from him it came into the hands of Christ’s executioners; from it was made the cross on which the Saviour of the world died.” It will be agreed that, reduced to these terms, the legend of the wood of the cross does not display much inventiveness, though the root idea of the underlying continuity of the two Dispensations gives it a certain dignity. The legend of Judas’s thirty pieces of silver has a similar flavour.

The coins were minted by Abraham’s father, and used by Abraham to buy a piece of land as a burial-place for himself and his

| family. Later they came into the hands of Jacob’s sons, being the money paid them by the slave-dealers to whom they had sold Joseph; Jacob’s sons in turn paid the same coins over for the corn that Joseph supplied them with in Egypt. When Jacob died they were expended on spices for his burial, and thus reached the land of Sheba, where they remained till the Queen of Sheba included them amongst other gifts to Solomon’s temple. From Jerusalem the coins passed into Arabia to come back again with the Magi. The

Virgin Mary took them with her on the flight into Egypt, and there lost them. ‘They were found by a shepherd who kept them by him until, stricken with leprosy, he went to Jerusalem to ask Christ

to cure him. In gratitude he gave the thirty coins to the Temple, and from the hands of the priests they passed to Judas, the wages of his betrayal. When Judas repented and gave back the price of his crime to the priests, they gave half of it to the soldiers who guarded Christ’s tomb and the other half to the potter from whom | was bought a field wherein to bury strangers.*° A similar succession of events has been used to identify the stone

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 27 in the coronation-chair of the sovereigns of England in Westminster Abbey with the stone used as a pillow by the patriarch Jacob.*' Many examples could be quoted of such puerile linking up of historical memories to produce narratives that appear to be highly elaborated, but which in reality are childishly simple. The fancies of popular imagination have not been at work only

on the famous names and events of sacred history. ‘That imagination has often been given its head with reference to well-known saints, the presence of whose tombs and the existence of a living cultus of whom prevented their being overlooked or confused with one another. The obvious thing to do was to group them together, to contrive family relationships or an activity in common, to invent a story in which each one of them should have his own fixed part

to play, without regard to whether the same saint might not be taking incompatible parts in two different groups. Thus whole cycles of legends have arisen that are purely imaginary, in spite of their historical names and a given topographical setting. The best-known example is that of the Roman martyrs, whose legends form a series of cycles, each one comprising a number of

saints, who frequently had nothing in common but their burial place.** Some of these legends are interesting and, in parts, not without poetry; others, and they form the majority, are trifling and irrelevant. All the same, taken as a whole, a picture emerges from these legends, one that was not designed but is nevertheless

impressive: if only there had been a poet to work up the raw material of these shapeless stories, the result could have been an epic of Christian Rome from St Peter’s foundation of the mother and mistress of the churches, through the bloody conflicts of the days of persecution, down to the victory under Silvester and Constantine. But the genius who might have been able to give us this masterpiece did not appear; and our sense of the subject’s grandeur enables us the more to appreciate the poverty of the legends

that we have and the lack of inspiration and originality in the productions of the people at large.

26 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS

I1.—Predominance of sense impressions over ideas. Localizations

and identifications. Literary origin of some of these. Legends arising from pictures and statues. Popular etymology. Miracles. Crowd psychology. Vigour of expression. Intensity of feeling. Ambitions of particular churches. Mass morality. Local claims.

The mass mind, then, is narrow, unable to deal with several ideas at once, or even with a single idea if it be at all complex, unable too to follow any chain of reasoning that is close or subtle; but

all ready, on the other hand, to receive impressions through the senses. An idea is easily obliterated, but a picture remains; the people as a whole is attracted by the material side of things, its thoughts and feelings are all associated with objects of sense. In this its intellectual level is that of a child, for abstractions are meaningless to a child too and it turns instinctively to whatever is glittering and attractive to the senses; the thoughts and memories of a child are all indissolubly bound up with concrete material

things. ,

And so great men live less in the people’s memory than in the stones, rocks, buildings with which their names have become associated by popular whim. For the people’s mind hankers after something definite. It is not satisfied with knowing that such-and-such

a hero passed through the country—it points out the exact spot where he set foot, the tree beneath which he sheltered, the house in which he lodged. Alexander’s oak, for instance, which in Plutarch’s day was pointed out near the river Cephissus as the place where he

pitched his tent at the battle of Chaeronea;** or Horace’s house at Venosa, an ancient ruin which still bears his name, though no historical tradition associated it with him; or Virgil’s house at Brindisi, a dilapidated relic of the sixteenth century.** Then again, people always want to explain the origin or purpose

of whatever strikes the eye, to give a name to everything that attracts attention. Like children, they are content with the first

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 29 explanation that comes to hand, if that explanation satisfies their fancy and their desire to know, without any intrusion of thought— or of critical sense—to suggest the insufficiency or unlikelihood of

what they are inventing. Images that lurk in the imagination, famous names that are remembered, are carried over to curiosities

of nature or works of man without a moment’s hesitation. The same psychological cause is at work which, all over the world, has attracted well-known names to strangely-shaped rocks or unusuallooking cavities. In the religious field this instinct works powerfully under both its aspects.

From this point of view there is nothing more interesting than accounts of pilgrimages to famous shrines, and especially to the

Holy Land. The oldest narratives of devout pilgrims** are innocent of any trace of the hesitations and uncertainties that beset our

most learned expositors where topography is concerned; with magnificent assurance these pilgrims identify the place where David composed the psalms, the rock which Moses struck, the cave

in which Elias sheltered, to say nothing of the places mentioned in the gospels, of which not one is overlooked, not excluding the

mansion of Dives and the tree which Zacchaeus climbed. The degree to which material things dominate the mind, the senses stifle thought, is shown by the fact that people claim to have seen the very stone “which the builders rejected”’, and to have acquired relics e lignis trium tabernaculorum, of the three arbours which St Peter in his excitement wanted to build on the hill of the Transfiguration.”°

In the same way saints’ names are often associated with old monuments or noteworthy places which have a popular appeal. It is natural enough that in Rome the Mamertine prison should have been taken to be the place of St Peter’s imprisonment, and that people should believe themselves able to show the exact spot where

Simon Magus fell: Silex ubi cecidit Simon Magus.®" Nor is it surprising that so many places in Ireland are associated with the memory of St Patrick, in Naples with St Januarius, in Touraine and around Autun with St Martin.

30 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS. It is no less a particular example of a universal phenomenon that slight hollows in rocks should be greeted as the print of the feet, the hands, the knees of St Peter, St George, St Martin, just as elsewhere the footmarks of Adam, of Abraham, of Moses, of Buddha are shown.”* It is a matter of indifference that many of these attributions, especially where megalithic monuments are concerned, have been christianized and that the Blessed Virgin and other saints should have taken the places of the heroes of heathen legends; that St Cornelius, rather than somebody else, should turn King Adar’s soldiers to stone, thus forming the avenues of Carnac and Erdeven in Brittany,” that a fairy, rather than St Frodoberta, should drop stones useless for building purposes near the Maillard pool in the département of Seine-et-Marne,”™ does not affect the identity of popular tradition, still manifesting the intellectual level of childhood.

It must not be forgotten that very precise localizations often have an origin that is purely literary. Romeo and Juliet existed only in poetical imagination,” but the visitor to Verona is shown their dwellings and their tomb; two ruined castles on neighbouring hills have become the residences of the Capulets and Montagues.°** In Alsace are shown the forge which Schiller ‘“immorta-

lized” in his ballad of Fridolin, and the castle of the counts of Saverne, despite the fact that these gentlemen never existed.** And

this example shows that traditions of this kind do not need much time in which to take root and grow. Until Schiller versified the old

tale in 1797 it had never been localized in Alsace; the popularity of his telling of it was all that was needed to materialize the tale and settle it exactly in a particular place.

Hagiography provides plenty of examples of such topograph-

ical legends. At Sofia (Sardica) near the church of St Petka (Parasceve), there is to be seen an aged tree-trunk half buried in a wall and covered with notches. This is known as St Therapon’s Tree, and the people believe that the saint was martyred close by it. On his feast-day, May 27, they come in pilgrimage, and make a point of taking away little pieces of the sacred wood, to which

special powers are attributed. Now St Therapon did not die at

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 31 Sardica; he belonged to Sardis, and according to his legend a great

oak-tree grew up there from the ground his blood had soaked. This oak, always in leaf, was, we read, still in place and curing every disease.°* Sardis having once been confused with Sardica, the miraculous tree soon followed the name of the town and was “‘transplanted’’.”

In view of this sort of thing there is little need to insist on the fallaciousness of trying to follow a saint’s movements by means of the landmarks offered by legend. Such attempts have sometimes

been made, and history has not exactly reaped advantage from them.”®

Popular fancy has not been at work only on buildings and natural stones. Pictures and statues wrongly interpreted have been the starting-point of a crowd of odd legends.*’ A poet is represented

resting his foot on a big book; so he must have been the most learned of mankind, for he could read with his feet.°* During the middle ages the two fine statues on Monte Cavallo in Rome gave currency to a curious story: they were said to represent two fam-

ous philosophers, named Phidias and Praxiteles, who came to Rome in the reign of Tiberius and had the peculiar habit of walking about the city stark naked, in order to teach the nothingness of earthly things.””

What has not been imagined to explain images of saints? St Lucy is sometimes represented carrying two eyes on a plate, to remind people that she is invoked for the cure of eye troubles. This gave rise to the story that, to rid herself of the attentions of a young man enamoured of the beauty of her eyes, Lucy plucked

them from their sockets and threw them to the tiresome youth, imploring him to leave her alone.**® The origin of the legend of St

Nicholas and the three children is also generally attributed to a pictorial convention," and a symbol taken materially led to a whole romance growing round a feature in the Life of St Julian the Hospitaller.*°’ Later on we shall see that the extraordinary story of St Livrade (Liberata) merely transposes into popular

32 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS terms the explanation of the peculiar features of a religious image. Here is another example drawn from hagiography. An inscrip-

tion, now in the museum at Marseilles, refers to a certain Euse-

bia, abbess of Saint Quiricus: Hic requtescit in pace Eusebta religiosa magna ancella Dei, without indication that any cultus was accorded to this worthy woman. But her body had been laid in an older stone coffin, which bore the carved image of the dead person for whom it had originally been intended; it was the head and shoulders of a clean-shaven man, which in the course of time had become worn and damaged. This was enough to give birth to a legend, which related that St Eusebia, abbess of a convent at

Marseilles, together with her forty companions, cut off their noses to escape outrage by the Saracens. “Quam traditionem confirmat generosae illius heroinae effigies, dimidia facie et naso praeciso supra tumulum posita cum epigraphe”’, says a Benedictine monk quoted by Le Blant.*°**

More than one legend owes its existence to names misunderstood, or to resemblances in sound. To the vagaries of popular etymology collected by several learned scholars,*** there must be

added a very numerous body of cases that are special to hagiography; but we must confine ourselves to a few brief examples. _

The church of SS. Nereus and Achilleus in Rome, on the Appian Way near the Baths of Caracalla, was known in ancient times as the Titulus de Fasciola.*°’ Opinions differ about the meaning of this term. Some think that Fasciola is the name of the found-

ress of the church; others regard it as a topographical expression whose origin is obscure. The scholars may hesitate, but legend knows nothing of hesitation. The name Fasciola, it tells us, is a reminiscence of St Peter. As he went by there on his way from prison, a bandage (fasciola) round his injured leg fell off, ““Tunc beatissimus Petrus’’, says an old account, “dum tibiam demolitam haberet de compede ferri, cecidit ei fasciola ante Septisolium in via nova’.*°** Notice the unsophisticated mind of the people,

which thinks that a famous man cannot drop his handkerchief without the spot being at once marked and remembered and honoured by the setting up of a memorial.

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 33 It is well known that a sound may influence people’s idea of a saint, with the result that a pun is sometimes decisive in the choice of a patron. In France, for example, St Clare is invoked in cases

of eye trouble, because she enables people to see clearly (voir clair); St Quen cures the deaf, because he enables them to hear (ouir); St Cloud cures boils (clous). In some parts of Germany it is St Augustine who heals bad eyes (Auge), in other parts he is invoked against a bad cough (Husten). Lists have been made of these plays on words;*” they are not all of popular origin, scholars have amused themselves by adding to them. There is one of rela-

tively recent date that had a surprising and regrettable success : thanks to his name, St Expeditus came to be regarded as the advocate in cases of pressing emergency.*”®

Owing to the working of phonetic laws, the names of some saints have become unrecognizable. Near Rome, on the way to Porto, there is a little country church, a dependency of the basilica of St Mary “in via Lata’, which is known as Santa Passera. No such saint is to be found in the calendars. Who was she? Unbelievably enough, the chapel and its name are meant to commemorate the translation of the relics of SS. Cyrus and John, martyrs formerly honoured at Menuthis, near Alexandria. Saint Cyrus, &BBa K tSpoc Abbacirus, was finally transformed into Passera.*°** Did this metamorphosis end there, or has the new female saint acquired her own legend ? I do not know, but it would

not surprise me if she has. The least that could happen is that St Passera should be confused with St Praxedes—and that has come about.**°*

Surely enough has now been said to show that, among the people at large, the senses govern the understanding, that there is

a certain sluggishness of mind that stops short at what can be touched, seen, heard, unable to rise to a higher level. This mental insufficiency explains people’s blind attraction towards what is marvellous, the supernatural made concrete. The thought of the invisible sovereignty of divine Providence is not enough; the inward working of grace does not offer anything that can be seen or taken hold of; and the soul’s mysterious commerce with God

34 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS has to be translated into concrete effects if it is to make any impression on the people’s mind. The supernatural makes full appeal to it only if the supernatural is blended with the marvellous, and

consequently popular legends are overflowing with wonders. Visions, prophecies and miracles are a necessary part of the lives of saints as recounted by the people.

There is no point in writing here about the marvels wrought through the intercession of wonder-working saints in favour of those who visit their shrines or touch their relics; these form a special class of event, which needs to be studied separately. But everything to do with the saint is, as it were, impregnated with miraculous elements. His greatness is heralded before he is yet born, and visible signs of Heaven’s favour attend his cradle; angels

watch over his every footstep, nature is at his command, wild beasts acknowledge his power; in direct peril he can always count on rescue from on high. Indeed, it would seem that God in a way defers to the whims of his friends, multiplying wonders without

any observable reason. The staff of St Géry (Gaugericus) stood upright without support all the time its owner was praying,*** and the same thing happened while St Julian talked with King Chlotar.**” Several saints hung their cloaks on a sunbeam, or gave back life to fowls already turning on the spit. Bd Marianus Scotus

needed no candle when he wrote after dark, for his fingers gave off the necessary light.1* The same convenience was granted to a peasant, at the prayer of St Sebald, to enable him to find his straying kine."’* St Ludwin was protected from the sun’s rays by an eagle’s outstretched wings,"’ and St Landoald’s servant carried fire to his master in the skirt of his tunic.’** Joshua’s miracle was renewed in favour of St Ludwin to allow him to or-

dain priests at Rheims and at Laon, both on the same day.™ This is a field in which popular imagination knew no limits; and

it cannot be denied that, in certain environments, especially among people of poetic disposition, these bold and artless fictions sometimes attain a real beauty.

However, the fertility of these hagiographical “troubadours” must not be exaggerated. A methodical classification of the themes

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 39 that they use shows that repetitions are frequent, and that the semblance of variety found in some groups of legends is principally due to new arrangements of old commonplaces. We must especially beware of supposing that from an artistic standpoint the level of the miracle-centred productions of popular hagiography is in general a high one. Apart from a few really happy finds and interesting motifs well marked out, we are confronted with nothing but platitudes and grotesque fancies that are frequently altogether fantastic. The feverish imagination thirsts for wonders, it is itching with ambition to outstrip extraordinary stories by others yet more extraordinary; and only too often it exceeds all propriety in a sphere wherein opportunities for ingenius fiction are endless.

The time came when the miracle of relics arriving in an abandoned ship*** had been related so often that it appeared trite; so they were made to float on the water in a stone coffin. ‘Thus did St Mamas come to Cyprus,’ St Julian to Rimini,*”° St Liberius to Ancona.’” For a child to stir in his mother’s womb, as did St John the Baptist, was esteemed not to do justice to a holy man’s greatness. St Fursey spoke before he was born,’”’ and so did St Isaac, who made his voice heard three times in one day.*** This hardly surpasses the prodigy of St Rumwold, an English baby who lived only three days; he not only pronounced his profession of faith in such a way as to be understood by all the bystanders, but also preached a long sermon to his parents and relatives before dying.***

In the Acta Petri we read of a seven-months-old child who, ‘in a manly voice’, addressed passionate reproaches to Simon Magus;’”* and what is more, of a big dog which talked with St Peter, and was entrusted by him with a message for Simon.** Commodian has preserved the memory of a lion which spoke up in support of St Paul’s preaching.**’ It is possible that these stories

are reminiscences of Balaam’s ass, unless indeed they were sug-

gested by reading the fabulists.

36 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS Such wild excesses invite us to consider the emotions which beset the people at large, intense, unrestrained emotions which give to everything they touch a stamp of exaggeration and sometimes violence, as so many legends testify. The multitude is moved by

very strong feelings: it knows nothing of moderate opinions or fine distinctions, which it can neither perceive nor express; when it says what it thinks and feels it does so vigorously. One example from among many, concerning St Catald of Taranto. His holiness was manifested by some very remarkable happenings, and so an ecclesiatical inquiry was set on foot to decide whether they were miraculous or not. This was too unexciting for the public; and the legend tells us that the pope himself, with all his cardinals, visited Catald’s house and examined it from cellar to attic.’?® We are reminded of those painters all whose skill consists in liveliness of expression.

It is hardly necessary to remark that the people’s admiration for its favourites is always unmeasured (and sometimes unjustified). Every good quality is attributed to them, and it is intolerable that other men should appear yet more worthy. Though it has nothing to do with the history of the saints, there is a specially instructive example of this in the legend of Saladin. His personal qualities, in particular his moderation and humaneness, inspired admiration and liking for him in those whom he conquered, and

gave rise to a wholly unconvincing story, which nevertheless strongly emphasizes the high regard in which he was held: his admirers could think of nothing better than to connect this Moslem leader with a French family and to make a knight of him, and almost a Christian.**? Again, when people’s imagination had been stirred by the great expeditions to the Holy Land, it seemed impossible that such a warrior as Charlemagne had no part in them; and so crusades were imported into the story of his life. At a time when every saint was endowed with every virtue in

the highest degree, and when gentle birth added greatly to a person’s merits, it is not surprising that some saints were posthumously ennobled. But to have lived amongst the Saviour’s immediate

following was yet more honourable than noble lineage, and

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 3/7 accordingly old patrons of churches were identified with certain persons referred to in the gospels or who were supposed to have

had some part in Christ’s life on earth. St Ignatius of Antioch became the little child whom our Lord showed to the people as an example of lowliness and simplicity;**° St Syrus of Pavia was the boy with the five loaves;*** St Martial carried the towel when Christ washed his disciples’ feet;**? and St Ursinus read a lesson at the Last Supper.*** It will readily be understood that legends associating the mission

of the first bishops of important dioceses with Christ himself, or with St Peter, were not prompted solely by disinterested love for the bishops. The passion for exalted origins which made first the Romans and then the Franks connect themselves with the heroes of the Iliad found this new ground for self-esteem, and once the process was started churches vied with one another for the distinction of apostolic foundation.

In the East these claims seem to have originated in a literary fraud."** The forger who goes by the name of Dorotheus of Tyre drew up a list of the names of all the men in the New Testament, and assigned an episcopal see to each one. He went to work with such enthusiasm that he included several names of people who obviously never were bishops, such as Caesar, whom he got from St Paul’s “Salutant te qui de Caesaris domo sunt” (Phil. 4: 22), without realizing that this Caesar was no other than the emperor Nero. ~ Jn the churches of the West, particularly in France,**’ claims to apostolic foundation did not arise in one uniform way; but this is not the place to inquire into the relation between the popular

and the literary elements in the development of these famous fictions. What must be said is that the inventors of pretentious stories could always count on popular co-operation in any enterprise that was calculated to flatter local pride.*** For as it is useless to expect a high degree of intelligence in a crowd, so it is to expect a high standard of morality. In the aggregate a crowd lacks that sense of responsibility which makes an individual person pause in face of a dishonest or unworthy course

38 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS of action. It has no scruples, each man leaving it to his neighbour to examine their title to what is claimed for them; there is nothing easier than to set a crowd tingling with patriotism, self-importance

or self-interest. So it does not matter much to know whether ‘‘apostolic” fantasies and such-like inventions are of literary origin,

or whether they are products of the people’s imagination which have been worked up by hagiographers, who simply arranged and polished them a little. They belong to the category of legendary productions, and are merely a normal development of popular ideas and aspirations concerning church origins. Enjoying so complete a freedom, there is no limit to the people’s

ambitions, there is no difficulty that can restrain their audacity. Neither time nor space prevents them from claiming as their own special property any honoured saint whose reflected glory they

covet. | Everybody has heard of the legend of the great St Katherine, whom her biographers connected with Alexandria, both by birth and martyrdom. That did not prevent the Cypriots from annexing her, a saint whose cultus**’* and legend were amongst the most popular in the Greek as in the Latin church; and this was contrived by means of a device that was as obvious as it was little creditable.

Stephen of Lusignan asserted that he read at Famagusta the Greek text of a life of St Katherine, from which he learned that her father, the famous Costos, was not king of Egypt, but of Cyprus; in proof thereof he had given his name to the town of Salamis, henceforth known as Constantia. At some moment of difficulty Diocletian sent Costos to Alexandria, entrusting him with

the government of Egypt. It was at this time that Katherine was born. She was very carefully brought up and became adept in all the liberal arts. After her father’s death she went back to Cyprus, where her uncle, learning that she was a Christian, put her in prison at Salamis (the prison was still shown in Stephen’s time). Later Katherine was sent back to Egypt, and there the emperor Maxentius, despairing of breaking down her resistance, had her put to death. She was martyred at Alexandria, which, the chron-

THE PRODUCTION OF LEGEND 39 icler adds, accounts for its being said that she was a native of that city.**°

The Seven Sleepers of Ephesus are so well known by that name,

and their legend is so remarkably detailed, that one would have thought they were safe from any attempt at transference. But in fact the cave wherein they slept their three-hundred-years’ sleep used to be shown close to Paphos. Stephen of Lusignan is a little surprised at this; but he tries to persuade himself that it might be a different group from the Ephesian one.**”

St Savinus was a martyr whose veneration is attested in the sixth century’*® at Spoleto, where there was a basilica in his honour.” The inhabitants of Spoleto naturally look on him as their fellow citizen, but so do those of Fermo (who have some of his relics) and those of Monselice. At Monte San Savino he has been made a bishop of Chiusi, the near-by town; while at Faenza

the citizens said that Savinus once stayed in their district and that, after his martyrdom at Spoleto, his relics were translated. Later on Faenza tried to pass him off as its first bishop.***

The connexions which the people endeavour to establish between themselves and their favourite saint are not always equally close. Often it is honour enough to have welcomed him, alive or dead, within their city walls, in which case they have only to invent a journey which does not affect the main lines of his history. It is by this simple device that the celebrated martyr St Nicephorus (“‘of Antioch’”’)"** became a local saint in Istria,’** and that St Maurus has been claimed by so many places—Rome, Fondi, Fleury, Lavello and Gallipoli, without counting Parenzo.**°

The author of legends is anonymous, and we have now seen him

at work. As he himself does not hold the pen, we have usually been obliged to have recourse to the hagiographer, who records his stories and discoveries; but hitherto we have turned to the hagiographer only in so far as he echoes the voice of the people. In what follows, our principal object is to discover what is his own particular contribution and to lay bare the mysteries of his trade.

40 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS NOTES ON CHAPTER II 1],azarus and Steinthal, Zeitschrift fiir Vélkerpsychologie und Sprachwissenschaft, vols i—xix (Berlin, Leipzig, 1860-89). G. Le Bon’s Psychologie des foules (Paris, 1895), treated from a very specialized standpoint, has some useful observations as well as some marked exaggerations. 2On this example and others like it, see Wachsmuth, “Ueber die Quellen der Geschichtsfalschung”, in Berichte iiber die Verhandlungen der K. Sachsischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig, Phil.-Hist. Cl. vol. viii (1856), pp. 121-53. It is worth remembering that legends of the

same kind grow up still. “Legend has made of the Civil Gode a 2,000article digest of the Revolution, made by order of the First Consul. In this abridgement of history the Code ceases to be the fruit of centuries of effort on the part of king and parlement and of burgesses in their communes and corporations; only the emperor is remembered; it is the Code Napoléon” (H. Leroy, “Le centenaire du Code civil’, in Revue de Paris, 1 Octr 1903).

8On the legend of Alexander, see P. Meyer, “Alexandre le Grand dans

la littérature francaise du moyen 4ge”’, in Bibliothéque francaise du moyen dge, vol. iv (Paris, 1886); J. Darmesteter, “La légende d’Alexandre

chez les Perses”, in Bibliothéque de Ecole des Hautes Etudes, fasc. 35

(Paris, 1878), pp. 83-99; I. Lévi, “La légende d’Alexandre dans le Talmud”, in Revue des études juives, vol. ii (1881), p. 203; vol. vii, p. 78; Meélusine, vol. v, pp. 116-118; S. S. Hoogstra, Proza-bewerkingen van het leven van Alexander den Groote in het Middlenederlandsch (s’Gravenhage, 1898), pp. i-xxiii; F. Kampers, Alexander der Grosse und die Idee

des Weltimperiums in Prophetie und Sage (Freiburg i. B., 1901). For the legend of Caesar see A. and G. Doutrepont, “La légende de César en Belgique’, in [7J@ Congrés des savants catholiques, vol. v (Brussels, 1894), pp. 80-108. For Charlemagne, see G Paris, Histoire poétique de Charlemagne (Paris, 1865); E. Miintz, “La légende de Charlemagne dans lart au moyen age”, in Romania, vol. xiv (1883), p. 320. 4G. Lumbroso, L’Egitto det Greci e det Romani, 2nd edn (Rome, 1895), p. 157.

5M. Du Camp, Orient et Italie (Paris, 1868), pp. 13, 60,74. 6The subject has been exhaustively treated by D. Comparetti, Virgilio nel medio evo, 2nd edn, 2 vols (Florence, 1896); Eng. trans. Virgil in the Middle Ages (Stechert, 1929).

7A. De Nino, Ovidio nella tradizione popolare di Sulmona (Casalbardino, 1886), p. 1.

SBulliot, La mission et le culte de saint Martin d’aprés les légendes et les monuments populaires dans le pays Eduen. (Autun, 1892); Shearman,

Loca patriciana (Dublin, 1879); W. G. Wood-Martin, Traces of the Elder Faiths of Ireland (London, 1902), vol. i, pp. 163, 245; ii, 20, 88. °F, Leonormant, 4 travers PApulie et la Lucanie vol. i (Paris, 1883) p.323.

NOTES ON CHAPTER II 4] 10Tt is well known that Alexander the Great has been credited with the

foundaticns of Alexander Severus, and doings that history attributes to Charles Martel have been attached to the name of Charlemagne. P. Rajna, Le origini del? epopea francese (Florence, 1884), p. 199. 11Acta SS., Nov., vol. 1, p. 49. 12Passio S. Procopii, no. 27 in Acta SS., July, vol. u. p. 564.

13Saint Cassiodore”’, in Mélanges Paul Fabre (Paris, 1902), pp. 40-50. 14Vita S. Frontonis a. Gauzberto. Cf. L. Duchesne, Fastes épiscopaux de Vancienne Gaule, vol. 11, p. 132.

15We have written of the value of topographical data in hagiographical legends in Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xvi, pp. 222-235, 243-244. For the people’s tenacious memory where place-names are concerned, see M. J. Lagrange, La méthode historique, surtout & propos de Ancien Testament (Paris, 1903), pp. 188-192.

16There are many examples in Les Passions des martyrs et les genres littéraires, pp. 136-315.

17Among other examples, the martyrdom of St Cecily, which is dated sometimes temporibus Alexandri imperatoris, sometimes Marci Aureli et Commodi temporibus. Cf. Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxii, pp. 86-88. 18A cta SS., Oct., vol. ix, pp. 100-104, 214, 276-278.

19Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xx, pp. 175-176.—According to the legend

of SS Chrysanthus and Daria, they were martyred under Numerian in 283, and their acts were written by order of Pope Stephen, who died in 257 (Acta SS., Oct., vol. xi, p. 484). As a pendant to this anachronism there is the legend of St Florian and his companions at Bologna: their martyrdom is dated in the twenty-seventh year of Heraclius (637), and the translation of their relics is put during the episcopate of St Petronius during the fifth century (Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xxiii, p. 298). 20See the quotations in Le Blant, Les Actes des martyrs (Paris, 1882), p. 27.

21/““He was indeed a man of distinguished appearance, chaste in body,

single-minded, affable of speech, of attractive presence, endowed with good sense and moderation, of resolute spirit, steadfast in right judgement, constant in long suffering, sturdily patient, quiet and humble, full of charity; and wisdom so adorned the beauty of all his virtues that, as the Apostle wrote, his discourse was at all times gracious, seasoned with salt.”] Acta SS., Jan. vol. ii, p. 37.

22/°*For her conduct was virtuous, her speech pleasant, she was kind to the poor, she could read easily and give an answer quickly, she was gentle towards everybody, modest among the high-born, like an equal to those

below her, and so sparing in her use of food and drink that none of her companions could be compared with her.”’] Acta SS., Jan., vol. ii, p. 1306. 23Some examples were collected by H. Gaidoz, “Légendes contemporaines”, in Mélusine, vol. ix (1898-99), pp. 77, 118, 140, 187.

24The texts were collected by A. Schwegler, Rémische Geschichte, vol. iii (Tiibingen, 1858), p. 260.

42 NOTES ON CHAPTER II 25Well-fed domestic animals were driven into the besiegers’ camp, or the enemy was pelted with loaves or, better still, cheeses (sometimes made from

human milk), to make them think that the town was well victualled. See G. Pitré, Stratagemmi leggendarii da cittd assediate, new ed. (Palermo, 1904), and also in Archivio per lo studio della tradizioni popolari, vol. xxii (1903-04), pp. 193-211. Cf. Romania, vol. xxxiii (1904), p. 459. 26Ovid, Metam., xi, 180 ff; Hyginus, Fabulae, 191, 3. “7H. d’Arbois de Jubainville, in Revue celtique, vol. xxiv (1903), p. 215. 28 Acta SS., Nov. vol. i, p. 839. 29Acta SS., Oct., vol. ili, pp. 188, 212.

80Acta SS., Sep., vol. vi, p. 124; H. Delehaye, “La légende de S. Eustache” in Bulletin de la classe des lettres de 1 Académie Royale de Belgique (1919), pp. 1-36.

81For instance, C. Cahier, Caractéristiques des saints, vol. i, pp. 315-

22. See also M. Meyer, “Ueber die Verwandtschaft heidnischer und christlicher Drachentédter’, in Verhandlungen der XI Versammlung deutscher Philologen (Leipzig, 1890). pp. 336 ff.

82Father Byaeus, in Acta SS., Oct., vol. ili, p. 838. 33Acta SS., Oct., vol. 111, p. 867.

34Prudentius, Peristeph., v. 102 ff. 35Acta SS., Jan., vol. ii, pp. 1025-1026. 36 Acta SS., May, vol. iv, p. 465. 87 Acta SS., May, vol. vii, pp. 202-231.

388. Singer, “Salomosagen in Deutschland”, in Zeitschrift fur deutsches Alterthum, vol. xxxv (1891), p. 186; and “Sagen geschichtliche Parallelen aus dem Babylonischen Talmud”’, in Zettschrift des Vereins fiir Volkskunde, vol. 11 (1892), p 301. 89 Acta SS., May, vol. iii, p. 215. 40Acta SS., Feb., vol. i, p. 679.

41Acta SS., Jan., vol. ii, p. 87. Qf Singer, Salomosagen, |. c., p. 185. 42K. Cosquin, Contes populaires de Lorraine, vol. i, p. 71. 43F,. Cosquin, “La légende du page de sainte Elisabeth de Portugal et le conte indien des ‘Bons Conseils’”’, in Revue des Questions historiques, vol. Ixxiii (1903), pp. 3-42; ib., “La légende de sainte Elisabeth de Portugal et les contes orientaux’’, in the same, vol. Ixxiv, pp. 207-217; ib., Etudes folkloriques, pp. 73-162; C. Formichi, “La leggenda del paggio di santa Elisabetta”, in Archivio delle tradiziont popolari, vol. xxii (1903), pp. 9-30.

44Bouhours, Vie de saint Frangois-Xavier, book iii. The Japanese legend is told by A. B. Mitford, Tales of Old Japan (London, 1871), pp. 40-43. The borrowing was pointed out in Revue des traditions populaires, 15 Aug. 1890. I am indebted to E. Cosquin for these references. 45See Fages, Histoire de saint Vincent Ferrier, vol. ii, pp. 46-47. 46Pausanias, vil, 5, 5-8.

47In Belgium it is not usually oxen that are used for the transport of sacred things. In the legend of The Christ of the White Ladies of Tirle-

NOTES ON CHAPTER II 43 mont it is the canons of Saint-Germain who find it impossible to carry their precious burden any farther. P. V. Bets, Histotre de Tirlemont (Louvain, 1861), vol. 1i, p. 88. Similarly with the relics of St George in Gregory of Tours, In gloria martyrum, c. 101. 48The texts have been collected by H. Usener, Die Sintflutsagen (Bonn, 1899), pp. 136-137.

49G. Pitre, “Feste patronali in Sicilia”, in Biblioteca delle tradizioni popolart Siciliane, vol. xxi (Turin, Palermo, 1900), pp. xx-xxii. 5°On the miraculous crucifix at Hoboken, near Antwerp, see P. D. Kuyl, Hoboken en zijn wonderdadig kruisbeeld (Antwerp, 1866), pp. 147-156; on the local legend of St Desiderius (Allier), J. Stramoy, “La légende de sainte Agathe’, in Revue des traditions populaires, vol. xiii, p. 694; on the coming of St Thomas’s relics to Ortona, A. De Nino, Ust e costumi Abruzzesi, vol. iv (Florence, 1887) p. 151. There may also be mentioned the legend of St Rainerius of Bagno, ibid., pp. 162-163. See also F. de Mély, “L’image du Christ du Sancta Sanctorum et les reliques chrétiennes

apportées par les flots’, in Mémoires de la Société des Antiquaires de France, series 7, vol. iii (Paris, 1904), pp. 113-144.

51Manzuoli, Vite e fatts de’ sant: e beati dell Istria (Venice, 1711), pp. 107-112. 52 Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xx, p. 269. 53S ynaxarium ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae, pp. 17, 750.

54Bibl. hag. lat., n. 5921. The site for the church of St Auxentius in Cyprus also was pointed out by the oxen carrying his relics; C. Sathas, “Vies des saints allemands de Chypre”, in Archives de lOrient latin, — vol, ii, p. 419.

55See the demonstration of this in E. von Dobschiitz, “Christusbilder’, in Texte und Untersuchungen, N.S., vol. ii (Leipzig, 1899). 56*Apollo triduum et tres noctes lacrimavit”, Livy, xliii, 13. 57Signa ad Iunonis Sospitae sudore manavere’’, Livy, xxiii, 31. 58Fortunae item muliebris simulacrum, quod est in via Latina non semel

sed bis locutum constitit, his paene verbis: ‘Bene me matronae vidistis riteque dedicastis’ ’’, Valerius Maximus, i, 8.

59Cf. A. Houtin, Les origines de TEglise d’ Angers (Laval, 1901), pp. 54-55. 60 Acta SS., Oct., vol. x, p. 787. 61Acta SS., Jan., vol. i, p. 820.

62Herodotus, Hist., iti, 43. Other parallels are given in R. Kohler, Kleinere Schriften, vol. 11 (Berlin, 1900), p. 209, n. I. 63V ita a. Paulino, no. 3. 64Acta SS., April, vol. i, p. 331. 65Pausanias, 1x, 23, 2.

66Cicero, De divinatione, i, 36; Olympiodorus, Vita Platonis, Westermann, p. l. 67Lipsius, Acta apostolorum apocrypha, vol. i, p. 272.

68P, Franchi de’ Cavalieri, “I martirii di santo Teodoto e di santa

44 NOTES ON CHAPTER II Ariadne”, in Studi e Testi, 6 (Rome, 1901), p. 132. The Acta sanctae Mariae ancillae (in Acta SS., Nov., vol. i, pp. 201-206) must not be cited in this connexion as they are not distinct from those of St Ariadne. 698Papebroch had already noted the borrowing: Acta SS. Bollandiana apologeticis libris in unum volumen nunc primum contractis vindicata (Antwerp, 1755, p. 370). 70Suetonius, Octavius, xciv. Antigonus, ‘Iotopidv napadsdE@v ovvayayn, 2, relates the same thing of Hercules. Keller, p. I.

71The hagiographical texts are collected in Caractéristiques des saints

by Cahier, who is not concerned with the early origin of the incident (vol. i, pp. 274-276). Many legends could be quoted in which other animals play a similar part, as of St Tygris, virgin, who silenced the sparrows

who disturbed her prayers and were never heard again (Acta SS., June, vol. v, p. 74, n. 9). For the same reason St Ursinus silenced the birds at Levroux; when he came that way St Martin restored their power of song (Acta SS., Nov., vol. iv., p. 103). Wild boars attracted hordes of hunting men to the neighbourhood of the monastery of St Caesarius of Arles; at his prayer the animals disappeared (Acta SS., Aug., vol. vi, p. 72, n. 36). 72These unnamed martyrs are referred to in the Roman Martyrology under July 28. 78 Metamorph., viii, 22.

74See P. Franchi de’ Cavalieri, Hagiographica, p. 124; and there are the torments of Mark of Arethusa: Gregory Naz., In Iulian., i, 89; Sozomen, Hist. eccl., v. 10.

75The principal classical texts are given by Wachsmuth, Berichte der k. Sachs. Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften, Phil. Hist. Cl., vol. viii (1856), p. 132. 76Acta. SS., Sep., vol. iv, p. 7. 77 Hist. eccl., vu, 13.

78H. Demoulin, “Epiménide de Créte”, in Bibliothéque de la Faculté de Philosophie et Lettres de PUniversité de Liége, fasc. xii (Brussels, 1901), pp. 96-100, where other versions of the legend of a long sleep are indicated. 79F. Kampers, Mittelalterliche Sagen vom Paradiese und vom Holze des

Kreuzes Christa (Cologne, 1897), pp. 89-90. Cf. W. Meyer, “Die Gesch-

ichte des Kreuzholzes von Christus”, in Abhandlungen der k. Bayer. Akademie der Wissenschaften, I Cl., vol. xvi (1881). 80See, for example, A. Graf, Roma nella memoria e nelle immaginazioni

del medio evo (Turin, 1883), vol. 11, pp. 462-463; L. De Feis, “Le monete

del prezzo di Giuda”, in Studi Religiosi, vol. ii (1902), pp. 412-430, 506-521. In passing, notice the version of the legend of the thirty pieces of silver in Solomon of Basra, The Book of the Bee, ed. E. A. Wallis Budge (Oxford, 1886), pp. 94 ff.

81]. H. Rivett-Carnac, “La piedra de la coronacién en la abadia de Westminster y su conexion legendaria con Santiago de Compostela”, in Boletin de la real academie de la Historia, vol. xl (1902), pp. 430-438.

NOTES ON CHAPTER II 45 82 Analecta Bollandiana, vol. xvi, pp. 217 ff. 83Plutarch, Alexander, 1x, 2.

84F. Lenormant, 4 travers l’Apulie et la Lucanie, vol. i (Paris, 1883), pp. 202-203. In the same way the site of Ovid’s house is still shown at Sulmona: A. De Nino, Ovidio nella tradizione di Sulmona (Casalbordino, 1886), p. 21.

85See especially the narratives of Antoninus, Theodosius and Adamnan: Geyer, Itinera Hierosolymitana saec. IIII-VIII, in Corpus script. eccl. lat., vol. XxxIx.

86Angilberti abbatis de ecclesia Centulensi libellus, M.G.H., Scr., vol. xv, p. 17.

871,. Duchesne, Le Forum chrétien (Rome, 1899), p. 17.

885. Reinach, “Les monuments de pierre brute dans le langage et les croyances populaires”, in Revue archéologique, 3rd series, vol. xxi, p. 224. 898. Reinach, op. cit., p. 355. 9°Td., p. 354. Many miraculous imprints in Italy have been remarked by

scholars; their notes were printed in Archivio per lo studio delle Tradtziont popolart, vol. xxii (1903), p. 128, and the preceding years. A number of these imprints are attributed to various popular saints. There are other

examples in F. Lanzoni, Le font: della leggenda di Sant’ Apollinare di

Ravenna (Bologna, 1915), p. 57. :

910. Frankel, “Untersuchungen zur Entwickelungsgeschichte des Stoffes

von Romeo und Julia’, in Zeitschrift fiir vergleichende Literaturgeschichte, N.S., vol. i (1890), pp. 171ff; iv, 48ff.; G. Brognoligo, “La leggenda di Giulietta e Romeo”, in Giornale Ligustico, vol. xix (1892), pp. 423-439.

82According to Dante the Cappelleti and the Montecchi were not historical people but types. R. Davidsohn, “Die Feindschaft der Montecchi und Cappelletti ein Irrtum”, in Deutsche Rundschau, Dec., 1903, pp. 419-428. On 8 July 1905 the “historic” house called Juliet’s was bought by the Verona municipality: see The Times, 10 July 1905.

83W. Herz, Deutsche Sage im Elsass (Stuttgart, 1872), pp. 278ff. | 94S ynaxarium ecclesiae Constantinopolitanae, p. 711.

85C. Jirecek, “Des christliche Element in der topographischen Nomen-

clatur der Balkanlander”’, in Sitzungsberichte der k. Akademie, vol. cxxxvi (1897), pp. 54-55. There are other examples of the same kind in this article.

96]. G. Bulliot and F. Thiollier, La misston et le culte de saint Martin d’aprés les légendes et les monuments populaires dans le pays Eduen (Autun-Paris, 1892), A similar attempt has been made concerning the life of St Radegund: see Analecta Bollandiana, vol. x, pp. 59-60. 87C. Kinkel, Mosaik zur Kunstgeschichte (Berlin, 1876), gives a whole

chapter to this question: “Sagen aus Kunstwerken entstanden”, pp. 161- | 243,

*8A. De Nino, Ovidio nella tradizione popolare di Sulmona, p. 17. 3

46 NOTES ON CHAPTER II 990, L. Urlichs, Codex urbis Romae topographicus (Wirzburg, 1871), pp. 122-123.

100See Anal. Boll., vol. xxxix, p. 162.

p. 351. ,

101Cahier, Caractéristiques des saints, vol. 1, p. 304.

102A, Ledru, “Le premier miracle attribué a saint Julien”, in La

province du Maine, vol. x (1902), pp. 177-185. Cf. Anal. Boll., vol. xxii,

103.,e Blant, Inscriptions chrétiennes de la Gaule, n. 545. [Which

tradition is confirmed by the effigy of that noble heroine, with mutilated face and severed nose, placed with an epitaph on the tomb”.| 104A, F, Pott, “Etymologische Legenden bei den Alten”, in Philologus, Supplementband, vol. ii, no. 3; O. Keller, Lateinische Volksetymologie (Leipzig, 1891); O. Weise, “Zur Charakteristik der Volksetymologie’, in Zeitschrift fiir Volkerpsychologie, vol. xii (1880), pp. 203-223. 105Qn this title, see De Rossi, Bullettino di archeologia cristiana, 1875, pp. 49-56; J. P. Kirsch, Die rémischen Titelkirchen im Altertum (Paderborn, 1918), pp. 909-994.

106Acta SS. Processi et Martiniani, BHL., N. 6947. [“At that time blessed Peter, his leg freed from the iron chain, let fall a bandage by Septisolium on the new road”’.| 107 Mélusine, vol. iv, pp. 505-524; v, 152.

108See below, chap. iil, 2. Cf. Anal. Boll., vol. xviii, p. 425; xxv, 90-98. 109A bbacyrus, Abbaciro, Abbdciro, Pdcero, Pacera, Passera is the series

of changes recorded by M. Tomassetti in Archivio storico romano, vol. xxii, p. 465. Passera and Abuquir are therefore strictly equivalent. Another instance 1s Sancta Fumia on the Appian Way; she is no other than St Euphemia (De Rossi, Bulletttno di archeologia cristiana, 1869, p. 80). There is also St Twosole, in whom it is not easy to recognize St Oswald; J. Aubrey, Remains of Gentilism and Judaism, ed. J. Britten (London, 1881), p. 29.

110°'T'omassetti, op. cit., p. 466. The Venetian dialect has produced numerous transformations of saints’ names, and very bewildering they are to foreigners. Thus the church of San Marcuola in Venice is really dedi-

cated to SS. Ermagora e Fortunato; San Trovaso is the local version of SS. Gervasio e Protasio; San Zanipolo of SS. Giovanni e Paolo; San Stae

of §. Eustachio; San Zandegola of S. Giovanni decollato; San Stin of S. Stefanin; San Boldo of S. Ubaldo; San Lio of S. Leone, and so on. See G. Tassini, Curiosita Veneziane, 4th ed. (Venice, 1887), p. 428 ff. There are also some interesting examples of the phonetic corruption of saints’ names in A, Longnon, Les noms de lieu de la France (Paris, 1920-23), pp. 400-446. 111A cta SS., Aug., vol. ii, p. 674. 112 Acta SS., Aug., vol. iii, p. 41. 113 Acta SS., Feb., vol. ii, p. 367. 114Acta SS., Aug., vol. iii, p. 772

15Acta SS., Mar., vol. i, p. 319; see above, page 22.

NOTES ON CHAPTER II 47 116A cta SS., Mar., vol. iui, p. 36. 117 Acta SS., Sep., vol. viii, p. 171 118See above, pages 22-23.

119Stefano Lusignano, Raccolta di cinque discorst intitolat: corone (Padua, 1577), cor. iv, p. 52. 1204 cta SS., June, vol. iv, p. 139. 1214 cta SS., May, vol. vi, p. 729. 122 Acta SS., Jan., vol. ui, p. 45.

1234cta SS., June, vol. i, p. 325. The motif of a child speaking before its birth has not been used only by hagiographers: see Mélusine, vol. iv, pp. 228, 272-277, 297, 323, 405, 447; v, 36, 257; vi, 91; vii, 70, 141. 124 Acta SS., Nov., vol. 1, p. 605.

1225R, A. Lipsius, Acta apostolorum apocrypha, vol. i (Leipzig, 1891), pp. 61-62. In Commodian, Carmen apologeticum, v. 630, the baby 1s only

five months old. Cf. C. Schmidt, “Die alten Petrusakten”, in Texte und Untersuchungen, vol. xxiv (1903), pp. 106-107. 1261 ipsius, op. cit., pp. 56-60.

127C'armen apolog., vv. 57-58. Cf. Schmidt, op. cit., pp. 108-109. 128A, De Nino, Usi e costumi abruzzesi, vol. iv (Florence, 1887), p. 195. 129G, Paris, “La légende de Saladin”, in Journal des Savants, 1893, pp. 284-299, 354-365, 428-438, 486-498. 130 Acta SS., Feb., vol. 1, p. 18.

131Prelini, San Siro primo vescovo dt Pavia, vol. i (Pavia, 1880), p. 312.

1382Vita S. Martialis a. Pseudo-Aureliano, n. 2; Bourret, Documents sur les origines chrétiennes du Rouergue (Rodez, 1887-1902), p. 13. 138Vita §. Ursini, in Acta SS., Nov., vol. iv, p. 109. 1347), Duchesne, “Les anciens recueils de légendes apostoliques,” in Compte rendu du trotsiéme Congreés scientifique international des catholiques, vol. v (Brussels, 1894), pp. 67 ff.

135Houtin, La controverse de Vapostolicité de VEglise de France, 3rd. ed. (Paris, 1903). Such legends are very flattering to national vanity, and they have been fabricated in other countries as well: see Anal. Boll., vol. xu, pp. 458, 462; xvii, 402.

136'The Greeks have been unable to refrain from crediting any holy bishop who was more or less contemporary with the Council of Nicaea

with having been one of “the three hundred and eighteen fathers” present thereat. So we must be in no hurry to believe those biographers who attribute this distinction to their hero; Anal. Boll., vol. xviii, p. 54.

137In a general sense the French word culte expresses the recognition , of every kind of excellence or superiority, together with the marks of esteem and respect expressive of it. In this translation the word is used in its Latin form, cultus, to designate the veneration, inward and outward, accorded to saints and to their relics and images.—TR.

138] usignan’s text is quoted in J. Hackett, A History of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus (London, 1901), p. 395.

48 NOTES ON CHAPTER II 139“Nella citta di Paffo é una spelonca: la qual dicono esser delli sette dormienti. Perd, noi ritroviamo nelli leggendarii, che li sette dormienti erano in Epheso, niente di meno essi citadini di Paffo dicono ab antiquo esser chiamata quella spelonca di santi sette dormienti: et possono esser altri di quelli de Effeso”; quoted in Hackett, op. cit., p. 456. On the localization of the legend in the East, see J. de Goeje, De legende der Zevenslapers van Efeze (Amsterdam, 1900). The various groups to which the title of Seven Sleepers has been given are referred to in Acta SS., July, vol. vi, pp. 375-376.

140Gregorii I Reg., 1x, 59; M.G.H. Epist, vol. u, 3, p. 82.

141Paul the Deacon, Hust. Langobard., bk iv; M.G.H., Ser. rer. Langobard., p. 121.

142h, Lanzoni, “La passio S. Sabini o Savini’, in Rémische Quartalschrift, vol. xvii (1903), pp. 1-26. 143 Bibliotheca hagiographica latina, n. 6085. 144Tb., n. 6086. 145 Anal. Boll., vol. xviii, pp. 370-380.

CHAPTER III

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER I—Meaning of the term “hagiographer’. Literary genres, Moralities. The ancients’ idea of history. Particular objects — of medieval hagiographers.

WE HAVE shown that the unconscious working on stories of the saints by the mind of the people leads to the weakening and obscuring of the evidence of history, often to its almost complete suppres-

sion. Have hagiographers been better guardians of historical tradition ?

At the outset we must state clearly that, under the term ‘“*hagiographers’’, we do not mean to include the whole class of writers who have concerned themselves with the lives of the saints. Some of them simply recorded what they saw with their own eyes and touched with their own hands, and their writings are no less

authentic memoirs than they are works of edification. These honest witnesses, known to everyone and recognized to be the purest sources of hagiography, are excluded from this study. So too are those well-informed and accomplished writers who

devoted themselves to historical work, such men as Sulpicius Severus, Hilary of Arles, Fortunatus, Ennodius, Eugippius. ‘They were the last representatives of classical antiquity, and their works, shot through with art and life, must not be confused with the artificial productions of later epochs which sometimes affect to be inspired by them. With those writers we class the conscientious biographers who, at various times in the middle ages, successfully took them as models and produced work whose value is not dis-

puted. We have to give all our attention to those conventionalized and dressed-up writings that were set down long after the events alleged and without any observable relation to fact.

_ Were we mentally to remove from the passionaries and 49

50 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS lectionaries of the West, and from the Greek menologies, all those

_ pieces which everyone accepts as historical documents, there would still be left a very considerable body of martyrs’ passions and saints’ lives of inferior quality: of these, some are unanimously rejected by the critics, others are regarded with suspicion. The authors of this residue (generally anonymous) are the hagiographers whose methods we propose to examine. The acts of the martyrs, composed long after the persecutions—I strongly empha-

size that point—form the greater part of their literary stock-intrade. What we shall have to say about these particular compositions the reader will be able easily to apply to others as well.

There is no need to make any distinction between Greek and Latin writers. From a purely literary point of view, the Greeks are usually better than the Latins; but for historical sense there is nothing to choose between them and they must be thought of as forming one single group.

When one wishes to judge an author’s work, the first matter to be decided is what sort of thing, genre littéraire, he was setting out to write; for it would be unjust to condemn an author in the name of history if he only intended to write imaginative fiction. Some hagiographical documents are clearly of this kind; they are parables or stories designed to bring out some religious truth or moral principle. The author tells a story in order to drive home a lesson more effectively, and he does not pretend to be relating

actual facts. Story-tellers among the ancients made great play with kings and princes; the Christian moralist naturally strengthened his lesson with the weighty name of a martyr or an ascetic. And even when it was not a question of teaching some truth, when the writer simply wanted to gratify the reader with an appealing

tale, “something about a saint’ provided a topic of interest that was not to be despised at a time when lives of the saints were the

| Christian’s favourite reading. _ It was not infrequent for a serious lesson to be conveyed to the faithful in the form of a tale about a saint. This was the intention

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER D1 of the well-known Passio S. Nicefori,’ and of the stories of Theodulus the Stylite,* of St Martinian,® of Boniface of Tarsus,* of

Cyprian of Antioch; the theme of the last named can be found again in the Faust legend.’ There is the recurring story of the devout woman who retires to a monastery disguised as a man; there she is accused of misconduct, and found to be innocent after her death. What is this but a pious novelette? The heroine is sometimes called Marina, sometimes Pelagia, or Eugenia or Euphrosyme or Theodora or Margaret or Apollinaria.*® It emerges as a favourite subject of the purveyors of edifying fiction. They often did not trouble to improve on a model, but simply adapted it as it stood. The story of Oedipus in all its sombre horror was applied to others besides St Gregory ;‘ it was used of an imaginary St Alban,°

of St. Julian the Hospitaller,’ of a St Ursius’® and others, and was widely read in the middle ages disguised as a saint’s biography.*** It is now common knowledge that the Life of SS. Bar-

laam and Joasaph is nothing but an adaptation of the Buddha legend.*” In the mind of the monk John, to whom we owe its christianized form, it was simply a pleasant, lively story that served as a vehicle for moral and religious instruction.

But fictions of this kind are not free from danger. So long as they are read in the spirit in which they were written, they achieve their object. But the time comes, and it may come quickly, when

that original object is forgotten. The true nature, genre, of a writing is often far from obvious, and it may be that our greatnephews and nieces will be very puzzled by some of the successful novels of today. In similar circumstances our ancestors felt no hesitation : for them, the fine stories that delighted them were history,

and the heroes of them were true saints equally with those who were traditionally venerated.

Sometimes, though less often than might be expected, it happened that, in favourable circumstances, these new saints came out of the literary setting which gave them birth and became objects of public cultus. Wherever and however this happened, it was deplorable. Yet is it not the outcome of a quite natural evolution,

to be expected whenever hagiographical texts are accepted

92 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS uncritically and without discrimination ? And when it happens, it

is very unfair to blame the hagiographer, who might well turn round and blame us. We ought first to find out what he tried to do, and then to judge him on that alone.

More often than not the hagiographer would reply to this question that his intention was to write history; and so it is important to have his ideas about historical writing and the duties of an historian.*** Need it be said that they were not the same as ours?

When we study and try to understand the way in which the ancients themselves understood history, we are less surprised at the ingenuous notions of it held by educated men in the middle ages.

With few exceptions—Polybius, for instance, and he was not to the public taste—classical antiquity saw little difference between history and rhetoric. The historian held as it were a place midway

between the rhetor and the poet; and when we consider the rhetor’s easy attitude to truthfulness, it is not difficult to estimate the distance that separates us from antiquity in the assessment of the historian’s business and duties. What is merely accessory for

us, was of the first importance for them. Their historians were concerned above all with literary effectiveness; they gave less con-

sideration to factual truth, and hardly any to exactness; as for critical spirit, they generally had no idea of it whatever. The main

thing was to please the reader by the interest of the narrative, beauty of description and brilliance of style. ‘The middle ages were in a measure the heir of the ancient liter-

ary traditions, and they did not seek new paths in the field of history. In particular they were not interested in criticism. When he did not wish to confine himself to the work of the chronicler or writer of memoirs, the historian became an undiscriminating compuler, much more preoccupied with what his readers wanted than with the toilsome quest for truth. The men of old who could be his models knew no more than he did of the complex methods by which we endeavour to separate truth from falsehood and to reconstruct the features of a person or a time. Moreover, the simple minds of these half-barbarian clerks lacked the first qualification

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 93 needed for the exercise of the most elementary degree of critical faculty : they were guileless, and never suspected that a piece of written evidence could be false, that a plausible tale is not necessarily true. It was the never-ending confusion between history and legend. In the middle ages, history meant everything that was told, everything that was read in books.

Obviously this elementary idea of history was shared by the hagiographers. Their work shows it no less than their own statements. Nothing is commoner in prefaces to saints’ lives than apolo-

gies for literary defects and preoccupation with literary style; the author often bewails his lack of skill and professes anxiety lest he should bore the reader. But he is clearly unaware of the ticklish problems that constantly beset an historian and, except occasionally, the only recommendations of his work that he offers are these common-form protestations of sincerity, which leave the reader unmoved and may even make him suspicious. Among the many hagiographers from whom we could learn about how the obligations of their work were regarded in their day,

here is one—the author of the Passion of St Fortunata—who in his opening lines testifies to the discredit brought by his predecessors and competitors on the kind of work in which hewas engaged :

“Sanctorum martyrum passiones idcirco minoris habentur auctoritatis, quia scilicet in quibusdam illarum falsa inveniuntur mixta cum veris”.’** Such a beginning is unusual, and one is curious to know how the writer proposes to bring the desired authority to the new passion that he has been asked to write. He hastens to let us into the secret: “‘Passionem sanctissimae virginis Fortunatae hac ratione stilo propriae locutionis expressi, superflua scilicet resecans, necessaria quaeque subrogans, vitiata emendans, inordinata corrigens atque incomposita componens.””*°*

Here is a man who 1s quite aware that all is not well with the writing of saints’ lives; but he can find no more effective way of remedying the abuses he complains of than by touching up the editing and the style. The idea of doing some new research, of studying documents, of comparing and weighing the evidence,

does not even occur to him. |

5-4 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS There was no public demand for anything better. When the monk Theodoric came to Rome, the canons of St Peter’s begged him to get to work on a life of Pope St Martin, of whom they had an account “in tantum rusticano stilo praevaricata atque falsata, quae doctas aures terrerent potius quam mulcerent”.**™ It was the classic complaint of everyone who wanted a writer to rewrite a biography or the passion of a martyr—they were shocked by its unpolished style. They were not interested in anything else. The hagiographer, then, shares the ideas of history current in his day. But he writes history with a special, clearly defined object in view, and this is not without influence on the character of his work; for he writes not only to interest people, but above all to edify them, to “do them good”’. And so a new form of literature is born, part biography, part panegyric, part moral lesson. Its inseparable drawbacks are too familiar to call for emphasizing. ‘The aim of the panegyrist is such that he is not bound to

: draw a portrait whose smallest details are exact; it 1s an idealized picture that is expected of him, one from which he is free to leave out his subject’s less attractive aspects. In the same way, the eulogy of a saint admits of no blameworthiness; and as saints are subject to human infirmities, the hagiographer who wishes to respect the truth is faced with a task of considerable delicacy. His faithfulness in this matter depends largely on his state of

mind. His concern is to edify: and if, for example, he can persuade himself that the saint’s failings, before or even after his conversion, so far from tarnishing his glory actually enhance the triumph of God’s grace, why, then, the hagiographer will not leave his subject’s human side in the shade, and will avoid putting him on so high a peak that others are discouraged from emulating

him. But there is a school of hagiographers who would gladly expunge St Peter’s denial from the gospels, in order not to tarnish the halo of the leader of the apostles. They conform, more than we could wish, to the strict requirements of the kind of writing they are engaged on. But before condemning them as misleading historians, we ought to ask ourselves whether the term “history”’, as we understand it today, should be applied to their writings at all.

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER D9 We must also bear in mind another factor which helps us to grasp the medieval hagiographer’s attitude. He knew two kinds of books : those which one was bound to believe, namely, the Bible in all its parts; and those which one was free to disbelieve. And he

was perfectly well aware that his own writings belonged to the second category, and that his readers were fully aware of it too. This conviction that some books contained absolute truth, while others sometimes departed from it, naturally gave him a quite easy mind with regard to historical accuracy. And it accounts for the feigned indignation, so often found amongst hagiographers, against those who do not put faith in what they have written, an indignation that betrays the man whose conscience is not wholly

clear. | WI—Sources. False attributions. Written tradition. Oral tradition. Pictorial tradition. Fragments of the past. Selection of

sources. Interpretation of sources. Inscriptions. Use of various kinds of document.

We have seen how our pious writers generally understood their task when professing to write as historians. We must now examine

how they carried it out, and what historical elements may be looked for in their work. As always, it is a matter of settling a two-

fold question in each particular case: what were the sources at | their disposal, and what use did they make of them? In general, they did not trouble themselves to tell their readers where they got their information; indeed, they sometimes seem, like some classical authors, rather coyly to hide the sources of their knowledge. Sometimes, too, they do not hesitate to represent themselves as eye-witnesses of things which they have got from written

documents,” or which they have themselves invented. Writers who are worthy of credence’” have made apt use of the biblical

56 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS © phrase Quod vidimus oculis nostris, quod perspeximus ..., “that which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon” — (1 John 1: 1); but there have not been wanting deceivers to abuse

it..° Others have appropriated the familiar words of Eusebius when speaking of Diocletian’s persecution in Palestine, 6 xa0’ huts

Stwypdc, “the persecution in our own time,”’*° and so passed

tablets.” |

themselves off as contemporaries.** We must be quite especially wary of our authors when they claim to have discovered inscribed

There are so many examples of it that we must suppose that

hagiographers considered it legitimate to use the literary fiction of speaking in the name of a saint’s personal disciple, in order to give

more weight to the narrative. There are Eurippus, said to be a follower of St John the Baptist;** Pasicrates, St George’s servant;** Augarus, St Theodore’s secretary ;*° Athanasius, St Katherine’s shorthand-writer;’* Nilus, companion of St Theodotus,”’ and ‘Theotimus, of St Margaret;*° Evagrius, disciple of St Pancras of ‘Taormina;*” Florentius, servant of SS. Cassiodorus, Senator and Dominata;*° Gordian, St Placid’s servant;** and Enoch, who witnessed the doings of St Angelus.*? This list is far from exhaustive.

A variation was to attribute the narrative to some well-known person, as the Passion of SS. Menas, Hermogenes and Eugraphus,

which St Athanasius is supposed to have written,** and the account of the image of Camuliana, attributed to St Gregory of Nyssa,°* and so on.

So it is no use trusting to the hagiographers; we must examine their works themselves if we are to discover the elements of which they are composed.

The classification of historical sources proposed by Droysen can be conveniently applied to hagiography. They fall into two broad categories : tradition and remains of the past.

Tradition comprises in the first place written tradition: narratives, annals, chronicles, memoirs, biographies, historical

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 57 inscriptions and other writings of all sorts. It is unnecessary to point out that all these kinds of document have been, according to the circumstances, at the disposal of hagiographers; but it would be a mistake to suppose that scarcity of documents has commonly

turned people from working as historians or discouraged them from writing saints’ lives. On the other hand, if a writer gives his reader plenty of information it does not necessarily follow that he was himself well informed : we shall see later how hagiographers

filled the gaps in their sources. ,

Another error, and a very common one, is to assume that during the first centuries of the Church there existed authentic accounts of all martyrs who were honoured with a public cultus,

and to infer from this that accounts of them which are clearly

later in date are derived from an original contemporary version.

Because of special circumstances, the church of Africa was particularly well off in this respect, but its resources must not be exaggerated. St Augustine, speaking of St Stephen, whose martyr-

dom is related in the Acts of the Apostles, uttered these significant words: “Cum aliorum martyrum vix gesta inveniamus, quae

in solemnitatibus eorum recitare possimus, huius passio in canonico libro est’’.®°* Still, it remains true that the average value of hagiographical narratives from Africa is much higher

than that of extant accounts emanating from most other churches.

The exceptional situation in the African church has been altogether wrongly extended to include others. On the strength of a text which has since been reduced to its proper value, some scholars have stated that, during the period of persecution, the church at Rome had a body of notaries whose business it was to collect the acts of the martyrs;°° this alleged college has been curiously mis-

used to attribute to the stories in the Roman Legendary an historical authority which they cannot claim. It is certain that in the fourth century, when Damasus set up his famous inscriptions over the martyrs’ tombs, the Romans no longer knew the history of the greater number of them.*’? When the need was felt for cir-

98 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS cumstantial accounts of them, hagiographers could not rely on written tradition, because it did not exist.

Another source of information is oral tradition: the evidence of eye-witnesses or other contemporaries, accounts from indirect witnesses, stories current among the people, in a word every unwritten historical or legendary report that might be of use to the editor of a saint’s life. No doubt hagiographers sometimes were able to glean valuable information from the lips of reliable witnesses; but how much more often did they have to be content with a tradition deformed through long transmission ! We have seen above

how something retained in the people’s memory can undergo unconscious falsification, and with what strange accretions a hero’s history can sometimes be burdened. The hagiographer was always being confronted by fanciful stories, and they were very often the only ones that oral tradition could supply. It is hardly necessary to say that it is not always easy to decide the exact source of the legendary features which a hagiographer has used. He is as likely to have got them from literary as from oral tradition; often, indeed, what we are tempted to regard as the outcome of folk elaboration may have been drawn from his own internal resources. What is eventually said by a whole people must first have been said by an individual, and why should not the hagio-

grapher who wrote it down have been the first to add some legendary detail ? Oral tradition in written documents must always be considered with this possibility in mind. Pictorial tradition must not be neglected, for it plays an important part in hagiography. Artists as a rule find their inspiration in tradition, written or oral. But these two sources in their turn owe

something to the work of painters and sculptors, who transform and give back to them the ideas they have borrowed. We know for

certain that some writers of legends were directly prompted by paintings or mosaics which they had before their eyes; Prudentius, for instance, when he describes the martyrdom of St Hippolytus.** The panegyric of St Euphemia by Asterius of Amasea is simply a description of a series of painted pictures;*® and in the panegyric of St Theodore attributed to Gregory of Nyssa, the speaker directs

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER O9 the attention of his hearers to the scenes depicted on the walls of

the basilica.*° We shall see that more than one legend had its origin in an artist’s imagination, or in a wrong interpretation of some iconographic detail. Some hagiographers made a rather unexpected use of pictorial

tradition. In the Greek synaxaries a number of biographies of illustrious saints end with a detailed portrait, whose preciseness seems to reveal an eye-witness. But when studied closely it appears that these descriptions are borrowed from the manuals of painting

in which Byzantine artists found set out the characteristics of the unchangeable physical appearance of their saints.** Were this origin not recognized, an exaggerated importance might be given to these verbal portraits.

There, then, is what tradition in its various forms can offer to the hagiographer : a more or less faithful picture of the past and an adumbration of personal characteristics. But at times the past has left us something of itself, a building, a record, an authentic docu-

ment. In the same way we often possess something of the saints besides their memory, such as their relics, their shrines, sometimes their writings. The historian gets suggestions from all these; often enough the hagiographer has no documents other than these fragments of the past—here a hallowed body, a tomb visited by pilgrims, there a festival observed each year on the anniversary of the saint’s death. But the writer knows that this is not enough to satisfy people’s eager curiosity. If he feels obliged to gratify that curiosity, we can guess to what lengths he may go. We have now gone over the hagiographer’s ordinary sources of

information. We will suppose him well supplied with material, and try to watch him at work. The bent of his mind will be shown

by his choice of documents and pieces of information, in the interpretation he puts on them and in the way he combines them together. In the first place, we must not expect a very judicious choice from our writer; he has to impose limits on himself and he is bound to be moved by his own preferences. He has never learned to weigh

evidence, and all his sources seem to him of equal value. So he

60 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS mixes the historical element indiscriminately with legendary items, and it is not these last which will most usually be discarded if there is not room for everything. There are two medieval hagiographical collections which illust-

rate well the mind and methods of devout writers the nature of whose undertaking obliged them to keep their narratives short : the books of Gregory of Tours on the martyrs and confessors,

which saw the light at the dawn of the middle ages, and the Golden Legend of James of Voragine, which appeared at their culminating point. We do not know exactly what materials the good Gregory had at his disposal; but there were plenty of them in existence, of all qualities, and one cannot help thinking that he neglected those that would have interested us more and preferred

to concentrate on things that were sensational and out of the ordinary.*”* As for James of Voragine, it is no secret that he summarized the legendaries, and these collections are well known

to us. Certainly we should conceive the work he undertook in a different way from him, paying far less attention to what gives its particular character to his compilation. Both these writers simply catered for popular taste, and that, as we have seen, was instinctively drawn towards all that is marvellous and appealing to the senses; it is perhaps to this tendency that there must be attributed the loss of the authentic acts of a number of saints, for whom a too great popularity has wrought this harm.

Thus, without wishing to affirm that there ever existed written accounts of the death of the celebrated martyrs ‘Theodore and Menas, whose cultus is exactly localized, it is quite natural that the fabulous stories about them that so attracted the crowds should

have encouraged the hagiographers increasingly to ignore the more sober elementin their acts, and even to get rid of it altogether. Study of the manuscripts consistently shows that, when the choice was between a purely historical piece and a version dressed up in

fancies and fables, the medieval public did not hesitate. Nearly always it is the less simple form that is retained in most of the manuscripts, while often the primitive composition is to be found in only a single example.***

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 61

The historical value of a work does not depend only on the selection of sources, but also on the interpretation of them and the way they are treated. Were it not for fear of bemg involved in too much detail, we could set out here what hagiographers and their helpers have sometimes been able to make of documents whose interpretation calls for no special skill. ‘The clearest texts may be misunderstood, and made to give rise to the most unexpected deductions. A few examples will be sufficient.

The Scillitan martyrs were put to death on 17 July 180, at the beginning of the reign of Commodus; the text of their acts says so quite plainly at the outset: Praesente bis et Condiano consulibus XVI kal. Augustas. The first name was misunderstood, and someone or other took it for a participle. This participle was replaced

by another, an equivalent or thought to be: praesidente, praestante, existente, Condianus became Claudianus, and then Claudius, who was identified with the consul of that name of the year 200. Now at that date there were two emperors reigning together. ‘The aimperator mentioned in the text was easily altered to the plural, imperatores, and there remained only to add the emperors’ names, Severus and Caracalla.** This was done, naturally, without anyone suspecting what a disturbance was being introduced into the chronology of the persecutions by a correction that apparently was fully justified. ‘That is what comes of not being able to tell a proper name from a participle! The name of Amphibalus was given to the holy confessor who

was saved by St Alban of Verulam, because Geoffrey of Monmouth mistook. a chasuble for a man.* In the passion of St Fructuosus and his companions there occurs

this interesting passage between the judge, Aemilian, and the martyr: Aemilianus dixit: “Episcopus es?” Fructuosus episcopus dixit: “Sum”. Aemilianus dixit: “Fuisti’’. Et jussit eos sua sententia vivos ardere.*™*

A copyist, failing to notice the judge’s sarcasm, read fustibus for fuzstz, But this word means nothing by itself, so our hagio-

62 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS grapher boldly added to it, Fustebus eos sternite, “Beat them with rods’, thus adding a fresh torment to the martyr in order to get out of a bad reading.*" It was possibly also a copyist’s slight error that turned a natural

incident in the Acts of St Marciana into a miracle. A lion was let loose in the arena; it sprang at her fiercely, and stood over her

with its paws on her chest; then, having sniffed at her, it left her unharmed: martyris corpus odoratus eam ultra non contingit.’ The writer of a hymn in St Marciana’s honour confused odorare with adorare (unless indeed he deliberately touched up the hagiographer’s picture), and wrote : Leo percurrit percitus Adoraturus veniens Non comesturus virginem.*”* We must not fail to mention here a series of huge mistakes that were due to the carelessness of the editors of synaxaries and martyrologies, and to their summary methods of clearing up the difhiculties they encountered in their work of compilation. Thus, what is more unlikely than the feast of St Babylas and the three children

competing on the same date with another St Babylas and his eighty-four companions, and both having near enough the same history ? The origin of this duplication was a two-letter contraction

which was mistaken for a two-figure number. A moment’s thought would have put this right; but our learned editors found it easier to prolong the list of saints.°° They also concocted the three

pairs of saints who were named Cosmas and Damian, without | noticing the absurdities they were cheerfully accumulating.’** Set

beside such enormities, the duplication of St Martin on the strength of a simple question of date seems a trifling fault.°** It is

probable enough that a similar origin accounts for the two St Theodores of the Greeks, followed in this by the Latins.*** Two feasts would give rise to two legends, and educated men would seem to be to blame; for, as we have seen, the common people have

their own way of simplifying things, and they are more likely to confound two persons into one than to make two where one was before.

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 63 We need not advert to the odd explanations which the people’s imagination has sometimes conjured up to account for carvings and other images whose real significance was not understood. The

hagiographers promptly accepted them and used them in their writings. The critics have not yet reached agreement about the origin of the cephalophores, that is, saints who are said to have carried their heads about after execution. Did the people invent

this explanation for an iconographical feature? Or was it a writer who first put it into circulation? In any case it was the hagiographers who ensured its wide popularity, by giving it that authority which simple folk always accord to the written word.” It has been said with reason that very probably the Passion of St Eleutherius was in part inspired by the sight of the paintings or mosaics that adorned his sanctuary. In particular, the scene in which Eleutherius sits on a hillock and preaches to the animals gathered around him is reminiscent of the well-known represen-

tation of Orpheus. And here is an interesting detail: the writer says that the listening beasts, not being able to praise God with the voice, all lifted up the right foot in worship. It seems clear that he had seen animals walking in line in mosaic.*”

Our hagiographers have often had to pronounce on problems that they found more embarrassing, and we may ask ourselves whether their learned solutions—learning 1s a very relative term in

this connexion—are always worth more than the interpretations of the unlettered multitude. But those of us who give ourselves headaches trying, with the help of the best manuscripts, to reestablish the primitive readings of the Hieronymian Martyrology (most of the time without success), why should we be surprised by the little blunders perpetrated by our forerunners in hagiographical documents ?—as when they transformed the eighty-third mile on a

Roman road, LX XXIII mil [taro], into eighty-three martyred soldiers, LX X XIII mil [ites].°° Under the date June 12 there may be read without too much difficulty in the Hieronymian Martyro-

logy the entry: Romae via Aurelia miltario V Basilidis Tripoli Magdaletis. This is a double entry, of a Roman martyr and of one in Phoenicia. In the middle ages they were looked on as a single

64 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS group of the three persons, Basilidis, Tripodis et Magdalis: a new saint had been made out of the slightly distorted name of a town.°™*

There is no difficulty in admitting that these hagiographers were poor interpreters of inscriptions. ‘They succeeded in translating the classical Blonae] M[emoriae|, “of happy memory’’, as B[eati] M[artyres], “blessed martyrs’. °°” Sometimes in an epi-

scopal epitaph they came across the word sanctus, which in those days was an epithet of honour equivalent to “His Holiness’, or “His Lordship” as we say; there was no one able to tell them that, at the time these inscriptions were cut, sanctus did not bear the significance they gave to it, which it only acquired later. Mis-

takes of this sort have given an easy canonization to a number of obscure people.*? But such errors make no great impression, and would not always be avoided even in the age of the Corpus inscriptionum. Only too often inscriptions offered hagiographers traps that are very obvious to us, but into which they fell headlong.** They met

the epitaph of a maiden which described her as digna et merita, a memorial formula in use for a time. Now there was a St Emerita, and so her name was identified with the second of the two epithets.

The first naturally became the name of another saint, Digna, Emerita’s companion, and a highly dramatic and circumstantial story was told about these two noble sisters.°* The misunderstanding of the inscription of Pope Damasus in honour of SS. Felix and Adauctus gave rise to a hagiographical romance of unusual improbability, which supposed the existence of two martyred brothers, both named Felix.** The wrong interpretation of another inscription of Damasus® produced the legend of the men

who came to Rome from the East to carry off the relics of SS. Peter and Paul. Discipulos oriens misit, wrote Damasus, meaning thereby simply Christ’s disciples who came from the East to bring the Gospel to the Romans. The inscription to St Agnes, and doubtless several others,°** have also suggested new details to the imagination of hagiographers.”° An interesting example of a whole legend being suggested by

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 65 the words of an inscription is that of Aberctus. ‘The famous epitaph

mentions his travels; the symbolic queen became the empress Faustina, and the object of his journey the healing of a princess possessed by an evil spirit.°* With the help of various episodes which are mostly reminiscences from other legends, the hagiographer produced a very detailed narrative which was highly successful.®’ But for all that there is no need to entertain serious doubts about the episcopacy of Abercius and the cultus traditionally accorded him at his native place.**

Unhappily it was not in the middle ages alone that the erroncous interpretation of inscriptions, of images and of other ancient remains gave rise to legends. Before the days of De Rossi most of the scholars who worked in the Roman catacombs had no really safe criteria for deciding what was evidence for ancient cultus and what was not, and they thought they had found saints’ bodies in numerous tombs before which pilgrims of old had never thought of pausing.®* These relics, doubtful at best, were eagerly sought, and the people were often unwilling to be content with the name inscribed on the marble. Legends were composed on the model of the ancient passions; they seemed probable enough, and they were

certainly calculated to satisfy the pious curiosity of the faithful. The best known example is that of St Philomena, whose insignificant epitaph suggested the most ingenious arrangements and provided the elements for a narrative so detailed that it includes the martyr’s examination.’™*

Wrong identification of geographical names has been responsible for a number of mistakes, but these are of less consequence since they do not lead to the invention of objects of cultus but only to their localization. The reading Caeae Antonina instead of Nicaeae enabled the Spanish town of Cea to claim a St Antonina for itself.“* The inhabitants of Scilla in Calabria supposed that the Scillitan martyrs could only have got that name from their town. But the people of Squillace objected to this identification, claiming the Scillitans for themselves; and they pushed their claim with

so much confidence that in 1740 the Congregation of Rites authorized celebration of the Mass and Office of St Speratus and

60 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS his companions for Squillace.” Other places tried hard to prove that they had been visited by St Paul, as may be seen from the title of a book by Giorgi, published at Venice in 1730:D. Paulus apostolus in mari quod nunc Venetus Sinus dicitur naufragus et Militae Dalmatensi insulae post naufragium hospes, sive de genuino significatu duorum locorum in Actibus apostolorum. These examples are relatively recent, and they enable us the better

to understand the proceedings of medieval hagiographers when confronted by problems that were insoluble for them.

We have now seen the hagiographer at grips with his historical sources. He has made his selection, and has considered what he can take from it. How does he use his materials? This of course depends on his particular aptitudes and personal taste. When it is a matter of written sources we do not hesitate to prefer the hagiographer who has copied them slavishly and given them with the greatest fidelity, omitting as little as possible and adding of his own only what is absolutely necessary. There are cases where the hagiographer has been content with this modest

| part, and there is a curious instance of it in the collection of Metaphrastes: the famous Life of St Theoctista, whose author had written a slice of autobiography, was transcribed almost literally, and simply given a fresh preface. But as the new editor confined himself in this preface to high-sounding generalities, and did not trouble to warn the reader about what he had done, he succeeded

in further complicating one of the most important questions in literary history, that of Metaphrastes himself.’* Since he represented himself as the author of a writing that was full of personal details, all these details were naturally attributed to him, with the result of making him appear some fifty years older than he really

was. Nowadays we give rude names to writers who casually appropriate other people’s work, but in the middle ages a man did not mind being taken for a plagiarist. We know that a hagiographer generally prepared, worked over and adapted his material, and thus in some measure gave it the

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 67 mark of his own personality. He put it in good order and dressed |

it up in his best style; but he did not mind if he destroyed the character of his documents, and so would amplify them and combine them in various ways, thus producing a work which, if not

original, was such that he became entitled to give it his own name.

Admittedly it is dificult to draw up general directions for a literature which is so vast and so varied. Use of sources and methods of composition may be studied in one author or in a group of closely related documents,’* but not in the aggregate dispersed over the immense field tilled by hagiographers of all periods and all lands. Nevertheless it may be said, without doing them any injustice, that they often entered on that primrose path that leads to the embellishment of a story in order to make more impression on the reader. ‘The historians of antiquity occasionally

gave way to this temptation, which one would like to call innocent ;“° those of the middle ages succumbed to it often, and there are

certain cases where comparison of texts enables us to catch them at it. Here are two examples from relatively recent lives;*° it can easily be imagined what licence was taken in a less cultured age. When St Bernard came to preach the crusade in the diocese of

Constance, an archer in the service of the duke of Zahringen scoffed at the preacher and his preaching: “He can no more do miracles that I can,” he said. When Bernard came forward to lay hands on the sick the mocker saw him, and straightway fell senseless, remaining unconscious for some time. “I was quite close to

him when it happened ...” adds Alexander of Cologne, “We called the abbot, and the poor man was unable to get up until Bernard came, prayed, and helped him to his feet’”’. Not one of the eye-witnesses says a single word to suggest that the man had been dead. And yet a century later Herbert, author of a collection of St Bernard’s miracles, Conrad, author of the Exordium, and Caesarius of Heisterbach all declare that the archer was dead and that Bernard brought him back to life.” Everybody knows the touching incident in the life of St Elizabeth of Hungary when, in the very bed that she shared with her

68 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS husband, she laid a poor leper the sight of whom so sickened every-

body that no one would look after him. The landgrave, her husband, vexed, hurried in to the room and pulled off the bedclothes, “But,” in the fine words of the historian, “at the same moment the All-mighty opened the eyes of his soul and, instead of a leper, he saw the figure of the crucified Christ stretched out on the bed.” Dietrich of Apolda’s’* moving narrative was accounted too com-

monplace by later biographers, and they altered the lofty vision of faith into a material apparition. Tunc aperuit Deus interiores principis oculos, “God opened the eyes of the prince’s soul,’”’ wrote the historian :“” but modern hagiographers will tell you that in the place where the leper had slept, ‘““There lay a bleeding crucifix with outstretched arms”’.

IlI.—Dearth of material, and how it was supplemented. Amplifcation from stock. Acts of St Clement of Ancyra. Compilation and adaptation. Life of St Vincent Madelgarius. An old proceeding. Forgeries.

So far we have, almost exclusively, considered the case where the editor of a saint’s life follows the line set out for him by the materlals at his disposal. But his undertaking is by no means always so

clearly delineated. He may know the saint’s name, sometimes that he was a martyr or a confessor or a bishop or otherwise, and the holy place which is dedicated in his honour. But popular tradition may have preserved nothing more; and in spite of this the writer has got to satisfy the devout curiosity of pilgrims and others, and supply edifying reading matter from such inadequate data. While writing at some length about SS. Emeterius and Chelidonius, Prudentius®* nevertheless warns us that he lacked the necessary documents; and the author of the passion of St Vincent

begins by declaring that Probabile satis est ad gloriam Vincenti

, THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER _ .69 martyris quod de scriptis passionis ipsius gestis titulum invidit , inmmicus.*** This dearth of information, which by no means checked the fluency of his pen, has been a handicap common to a large number of hagiographers, and they were not embarrassed by it either. Since they had to write, and often, as they alleged, at the orders of a superior, they gallantly took the only course open to them and made liberal use of the method of development used in the schools, or else fell back on borrowing from other writers. The first way is the easier, and it has given us an abundance of flat, colourless recitals. With greater or lesser degrees of fluency and imaginativeness, numberless hagiographers resigned themselves to the necessity of making up for deficient sources by writing what seemed to them likely to have happened : omnia, quae in re praesenti accidisse credibile est, as Quintilian says (vi, 2). Suppose a martyr is in question. The setting of what is to follow is clearly outlined, beginning with a more or less detailed account of the persecution. Christians are being everywhere hunted out; many of them fall into the soldiers’ hands, among them the hero of the story; he is arrested and jailed. When brought before the judge he confesses his faith, and endures frightful tortures. He is put to death, and histomb becomes a scene of miracles without number.®?*

That, closely enough, is the pattern to which the editor has to work. Each part is capable of development, of which the elements are easily found in the historians who have related similar events, in other legends used as models, and by considering the relevant

circumstances; these amplifications are for the most part full of the exaggerations which are the stock-in-trade of public speakers anxious to make the most of what they have to say. Thus the picture of the persecution 1s always made as black as possible;** the

emperor or judge is generally presented as a monster in human form, thirsting for blood and interested only in wiping the new religion from the face of the earth. So much for the first of the stock themes.**

We must not let ourselves be taken in even when we are confronted with what appears to be an edict in correct form. Nothing is easier than to imitate an edict, Just as in our day it is easy to

70 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS imitate the jargon of an act of parliament or departmental regulation, especially if one is writing for a public that has never seen an encyclopaedia of forms and precedents.”

The interrogatory of a martyr is a favourite theme of the hagiographer, and it is on this part of his narrative that he principally relies for spinning it out to its required length. If he had used this dialogue as a means of making clear the martyr’s own character or his noble attitude, the hagiographer would only have been doing what the writers of antiquity did, for they interspersed their

historical works with conventional speeches, just as modern writers intersperse portraits. But it is only very rarely that we can detect some personal characteristic in this exchange of questions and answers. Instead, we are given dissertations on the absurdity of paganism and the beauty of Christianity, harangues of an un-

believable improbability, which would be more in place on the lips of a preacher in the pulpit than in the mouth of an accused - person speaking in court during a brief hearing of his case. The martyr’s triumphant eloquence is usually a foil for the ignorance and stupidity of the judge; but sometimes this official displays

a knowledge of the Christian religion and its sacred books that is sufficient to call forth a learned rejoinder from the accused.

The hagiographer has not often gone to the trouble of composing the speech he puts into his hero’s mouth; he finds it easier —

to copy a few paragraphs or a chapter out of some suitable treatise,*° a proceeding similar to that which has preserved the Apology of Aristides in the Life of Barlaam and Joasaph. No one who has read the authentic acts of the martyrs needs to be told how hollow this rhetoric sounds, and what a difference there is between the short, moving answers of the martyrs, instinct with the wisdom of the divine Spirit, and these studied declamations

that are like scholastic exercises. | With the interrogatory, it is the martyr’s physical sufferings that lend themselves most readily to amplification. The simplicity of the last act of the tragedy in the authentic reports, such as the Passion of St Cyprian, is not acceptable to our pious rhetoricians,

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 71 | who can conceive no other way of establishing a martyr’s heroism

than by making him undergo torments long and crude. They multiply these torments without pausing to consider the limitations of human endurance, for divine Providence is made to intervene to prevent the holy man from succumbing to such suffering, and to allow the writer to visit on him every torture that imagination or memories from reading can suggest.

The masterpiece of this sort of thing is unquestionably the martyrdom of SS. Clement of Ancyra and Agathangelus. The scene of their contests moves successively from an unnamed town in Galatia to Rome, to Nicomedia, to Ancyra, to Amisos, to ‘Tarsus, and thence back to Ancyra. This itinerant martyrdom goes on for no less than twenty-eight years, and is diversified by marvels

of very extraordinary kinds. The persecutors are the emperors Diocletian and Maximian, and the prefects Domitian, Agrippinus, Curicius, Domitius, Sacerdo, Maximus, Aphrodisius, Lucius and

Alexander. And these are the tortures that they inflict on Clement and his companion, Agathangelus.

To start with, Clement is hung up, his flesh torn with iron combs, and his lips and cheeks battered with stones; he is bound to a wheel, beaten with sticks, and horribly slashed with knives; spikes are thrust into his face, his jaws broken and his teeth pulled out, and his feet are crushed in iron shackles. ‘Then both martyrs

are scourged and suspended from a beam; their bodies are scorched with burning torches and they are thrown to wild beasts.

Red-hot prongs are forced under their nails, and then they are covered with quick-lime and left thus for two days; afterwards strips are torn from their skin and they are whipped again. They are laid on iron grids heated white-hot, and then cast into a fiery furnace where they remain for a day and a night. Once more they are rasped with metal hooks; then a sort of harrow is set up and

they are thrown against its tines. Agathangelus in addition has molten lead poured over his head; he is dragged about the town with a millstone round his neck, and stoned. Clement alone has his ears pierced with red-hot needles, then is burned again with torches, and beaten over the head with a stick, At last, having for |

72 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS several days running received fifty lashes from a whip, he is beheaded, and Agathangelus with him.* Only very occasionally have hagiographers carried their simplicity of mind, or rather their impudence, to such lengths; the accounts of martyrs’ sufferings do not ordinarily reach this degree of incredibility. Nevertheless, taken separately, each chapter of the passion of St Clement of Ancyra represents this kind of writing well enough, and it is only when the writers have come to the end of their own resources that they decide to make their heroes die. After so many surprising torments St Clement simply had his head cut off : this isso commonly the ending of a horrifying and miracle-

filled passion that some scholars have seriously inquired how it comes about that the axe or the sword should have been the most constantly effectual instrument of martyrdom when a succession of other means had been reduced to powerlessness. “It has been said that, the sword being the symbol of civil power in society, God does not allow his providence to render it nugatory, for he wills effective public order as the particular safeguard of numerous other interests. But might it not also be said that death by the sword was as it were a reprobation from on high of the barbarous inventions to which tyrants resorted, their hatred being such that it was not satisfied simply by putting Christians to death ?’® The Roman penal code was relatively mild, but it cannot be denied that some of the persecutors were cruel. Yet has the problem that has been raised been properly stated ? Ought not the question to be addressed to the hagiographers? It is they who have sooner or later to bring their ramblings to an end and kill off their heroes. The natural ending to the drama was the classical penalty—death by the sword.

The composition of the life of a saint who was not a martyr is governed by similar considerations whenever the author decides

to amplify. The narrative will necessarily be less dramatic and enthralling, but the scope can be more easily extended. If completeness is aimed at, the biography will fall into three parts. Be-

fore birth: the saint’s nationality and parentage, his future greatness miraculously foretold; his lifetime: childhood and

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 73 youth, the most important things he did, his virtues and miracles; after death: his cultus and miracles. In numberless lives of saints

at least one of the points in this programme is supplied “from stock”, and at times the whole of it is no more than a string of such commonplaces. The saint’s calling or rank is analysed. A bishop has not the same duties as a monk, different virtues are expected from an abbot than from a nun. Episodes vary accordingly. In the life of a holy bishop, for example, he never accepts election except under protest; for did he not resist, it would mean that he thought himself worthy of the episcopate, and if he took

so complacent a view of himself how could he be held up as a model of humbleness? In the case of a holy monk, he must be exemplary in all the activities proper to his state, and there could be no risk in recording his fasts and watchings, his tirelessness in

prayer and spiritual reading. And as it is above all through miracles that God shows forth the merits of his servants, we may be sure that any saint whatever gave sight to the blind, enabled the paralysed to walk, drove out evil spirits, and so on and so on.

The way of going to work that we have just described, simple and natural as it may appear, has not been used only by hagiographers who needed to fill the gaps in tradition. We have seen that the people’s voice is ready and willing to attribute to its favourite

heroes the qualities and distinctions of others, that certain noble deeds and striking happenings have become the common property of very diverse persons. Devout writers of the middle ages in their

straits often imitated these legendary borrowings, and did not scruple to let themselves plunder for their saint stories that had nothing at all to do with him. I am not talking about the pretty frequent case where an identity of name has introduced absolutely foreign elements into a biography, as for example, the legend of St Fronto of Périgueux, where we find a highly exotic episode taken from an Egyptian legend about a man of the same name.*” I am concerned with borrowings that are due neither to confusion nor heedlessness. Sometimes they are commonplaces

74 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS about Christian virtues that the writer has copied word for word; sometimes they are matters which could at a stretch be repeated, and have been expressed in the same terms; sometimes again they are wholly characteristic passages which have been deliberately

and unceremoniously incorporated in their entirety in another biography. I agree that we must be in no hurry to raise a cry of plagiarism

on the strength of mere resemblance. Occasionally a really disconcerting coincidence does occur, and I want to give one remarkable example. Were one to read that on the same day the Church keeps the feast of two saints, both of whom died in Italy, who in

either case underwent a change of heart through reading the Lives of the Saints; that each founded a religious order under the same title; and that both orders were suppressed, by two popes of

the same name; surely in that case one would feel justified in saying that a single individual had been made into two and entered

in the martyrology twice over, under different names. And yet there are two perfectly historical saints, and relatively recent ones,

_ of whom all these particulars are true. St John Colombini, who died near Siena on 31 July 1367, was brought to a Christian life by reading the life of a saint; he founded the order of Gesuati, and it was suppressed by Pope Clement IX.°° St Ignatius of Loyola, who died at Rome on 31 July 1556, was touched by grace while reading saints’ lives, which had been given him to while away the tedium of convalescence; he founded the order of Jesuits, and it

was suppressed, as we all know, by another Pope Clement. I do not recall these facts in order to suggest that such coincidences can

often be met: on the contrary, it would be very difficult to find another example like the one I have just given as a curiosity. The artless hagiographers of the middle ages, compelled to make up for the deficiencies of primitive sources by more or less legitimate borrowings, rarely present us with a really tiresome problem.

As a rule their methods are simple, and their secrets are easily prised open. The following example shows how a biographer of St Vincent Madelgarius set about honouring his patron by a piece of writing of adequate length.”

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 75 In the preface he begins by transcribing the prologue from the

Life of St Ermin, to which he adds a sentence from Sulpicius Severus; there follows a second introduction, which is word for word the preface to Gregory of Tours’ Life of St Patroclus. For the birth and early years of the saint he piles up reminiscences from

the Life of St Ermin, not to speak of others from those of Vincent’s relatives St Waudru (Waldetrudis) and St Aldegund, and the story of his marriage is straight out of the Vita Leobardi by Gregory of ‘Tours. Vincent’s son Landric enters the ranks of the clergy, and this is related according to the Life of St Gallus in Gregory of Tours. The same writer provides him with the main part of a vision (it fills one of the chapters of the Life of St Leobard). St Vincent becomes a monk and trains his followers : this is

taken from the Lives of St Martius and St Quintianus, again by Gregory of Tours. He gives himself up to prayer and penance, and is a model of monastic virtue: from the Life of St Bavo. Feeling the approach of death, he entrusts his spiritual children to his

son Landric: from the Life of St Ursmar. He is buried in his monastery, where those who invoke him experience his power : from the Life of St Bavo. A blind cleric has his sight restored at his tomb: this miracle is due in its entirety to Gregory of ‘Tours, who tells it of St Martin. There must be added to our plagiarist’s list of debts six chapters from the Life of St Waudru, which it is true he

used as an historical source, but he copied it word for word, and a mass of other reminiscences, too many to enumerate.

Lives of saints filled with extracts from lives of other saints are very numerous, and some of them are no more than patchworks of such borrowings. It 1s certainly daunting for the critic when he finds the same things told in the same words about two different persons. What trust, he asks himself, can be put in the Lives of St

Hubert, St Arnulf of Metz and St Lambert, which have several parts in common?*” What importance can be attached to the

biography of St Remaclus, which is a close imitation of that of St | Lambert ?°°

76 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS Some editors were so badly off that they did not stop at the verbatim borrowing of passages expressed in general terms, or even

of interesting incidents which seemed to fit nicely into their own writings; they were reduced to taking whole compositions and adapting them as best they could to their saint; sometimes only the names were altered. The Passion of St Martina, for instance, is simply that of St Tatiana; St Castissima has the same acts as St Euphrosyne, and St Caprasius the same as St Symphorian; SS.

Florentius and Julian’s group has an identical history with the group of SS. Secundian, Marcellian and Veranus, and many others. The list of these strange duplications is far longer than one would expect.**

A variation in the peculiar way of proceeding that has just been described is when the editor, keeping to the original hero and his history, nevertheless introduces a new character into it. Such is the case of St Florian, honoured at Bologna, who, in order to pro-

vide him with a history, has been introduced into the passion of the sixty martyrs of Eleutheropolis;®’ another is St Florent of Mont Glonne, whom it is very surprising to meet in the company of St Florian of Lorsch.*°

Greek as well as Latin hagiographers have at times availed themselves of the convenient process of adaptation. This can be seen by comparing the story of St Barbara with that of SS. [rene and Cyriaena,°*” and that of St Onesimus with that of St Alexis.” There are parallel cases in Syrian hagiography: the Life of Mar

Mikha does not differ from the Life of Mar Benjamin,” and St Azazail’s story is an adaptation of that of St Pancras of Rome.*°°

This way of proceeding seems so childish and arbitrary that one

is inclined to suppose that it was followed only at the darker periods of the middle ages, that such wretched plagiarisms were to be found only amid barbarous surroundings that had lost almost all literary culture. Unfortunately we have to recognize that from the fourth century open adaptations of foreign legends to national saints are found in Italy, and at Rome itself. In the Passion of St

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 77 Lawrence the gridiron torture, which it seems impossible to reconcile with the terms of Valerian’s second edict,*” is evidence of foreign influence; a legend about other martyrs current in the East is so like it as to exclude pure coincidence.**” In the curious story of St Cassian of Imola more than one reminiscence can be detected :*°* that of the schoolmaster punished by Furius Cam-

illus,°* and a feature (the stabbing with iron pens) from the Passion of St Mark of Arethusa.*"’ The martyrdom of St Eutychius as given by Pope Damasus*”’ is strangely like that of St | Lucian,**’ and the same pope’s version of St Agnes’s passion has undeniable points of contact with that of St Eulalia.*°* These are not yet plagiarism in its crudest form, the almost word-for-word copying of a model, but legend has already come to be looked on as anybody’s property; in a certain sense it constitutes part of the

‘common of saints’, and transferences are made on a somewhat considerable scale.

Editors of saints’ lives did not take their material from hagiographical literature alone. Thus the legend of St Vidian, a local martyr honoured at Martres-Tolosanes, is mixed up with the epic legend of Vivian, nephew of William of Orange, told in two of the chansons de geste, the Enfances Vivien and Aliscans :*°* the legend of St Dympna*”’® is an adaptation of a very well-known tale, and so is that of St Olive, which has been popularized in Italy, not by the Church but by the stage.”

The writings of which we have just spoken are literary frauds, and we are inclined to judge them very severely. As a general rule I should not class them as forgeries, or look on their authors as more blameworthy than those who innocently believed themselves entitled to make up for the silence of tradition by means of narratives mainly produced from their own imagination. They were reduced to the extremity of imitating those stone-carvers who turned the statue of a consul into a saint by giving it another head or by putting into its hand a cross, a key, a lily or some other symbolical object.

78 THE LEGENDS OF THE SAINTS But we must readily admit that hagiographical writing has been disgraced by a number of forgers who could not plead simplicity of mind as an excuse. Certain audacious fabrications, products of lying and ambition, have for long misled over-credulous minds and unwary critics, They include the Cypriot legend of St Barnabas,*** the too-famous translation of St Denis to Regensburg,*** the Life of St Maurus by the so-called Faustus, who was no other than Odo of Glanfeuil,*** the Passion of St Placid by Peter the Deacon, under the name of Gordian.**’ ‘The monk of Glastonbury who rewrote the legend of Joseph of Arimathea,’*® and the first authors of the apostolic legends of France, cannot plead their good faith before the judgement-seat of history. One can but turn from them with contempt, while marvelling at the

simplicity of those whom they deceived. ,

THE WORK OF THE HAGIOGRAPHER 79 NOTES ON CHAPTER III 1Acta SS., Feb., vol. 1, pp. 894-895.

2Acta SS., May, vol. vi, pp. 756-765. See H. Delehaye, Les saints stylites (Brussels, 1923), pp. cxvill-cxix.

3Acta SS., Feb., vol. ii, p. 666: P. Rabbow, “Die Legende des Martinian”, in Wiener Studien, 1895, pp. 253-293. 4Ruinart, Acta mart. sincera, pp. 289-291.

5Cyprian von Antiochen und die deutsche Faustsage (Erlangen, 1882). 6See below, Chapter VII. Cf. Acta SS., Jan., vol. 1, p. 258. 7 Bibliotheca hagiographica latina, nn. 3649-3651.

8Catalogus cod. hagiogr. lat biblioth. Regiae Bruxellensis, vol. u, pp. 444-456. Cf. Anal. Boll., vol. xiv, p. 124. °Acta SS., Jan., vol. ii, p. 974. 10Acta SS., May, vol. i, pp. 926-927.

11This legend has been applied also to Judas Iscariot; cf. Legenda Aurea, ch. xlv, De S. Mathia apostolo. See Creizenach, Judas Ischarioth in Legende und Sage ... (1875); V. Istrin, “Die griechische Version der Judas-Legende”, in Archiv fiir slavische Philologie, vol. xx (1898), pp. 605-619.

12K, Cosquin, “La légende des saints Barlaam et Josaphat, son origine”, in Revue des Questions historiques, October 1880, and in Etudes folkloriques, pp. 27-49. Kuhn, “Barlaam und Ioasaph”, in Abhandlungen der k. bayer. Akademie, I. Cl., vol. xx (1893), pp. 1-88. G. Paris, Poémes et légendes du moyen age, pp. 181-215. On the cultus of these saints, see Anal. Boll., vol. xxii, p. 131.

13The declamations of some of the ancients on the historian’s ideals and duties are well known; to watch them at work shows how far practice was from theory. The study of sources and methods better enables us to grasp their idea of historical writing and how to carry it out. On all this

see H. Peter, Die geschichtliche Literatur iiber die rémische Kaiserzeit bis Theodosius I, vol. i (Leipzig, 1897), pp. 200-204; F. Norden, Die antike Kunstprosa, vol. I (Leipzig, 1898), pp. 81 ff.

14Prologus ad passionem S. Fortunatae, v. et m., in A. Mai, Spicilegium Romanum, vol. iv, p. 289. [“The passions of the holy martyrs are held in less authority, for the reason that in some of them falsehood is mingled with truth.”]

15(“T have set forth the passion of the holy maiden Fortunata in my own words, leaving out whatever is superfluous, adding what is necessary, amending what is corrupt, correcting what is exaggerated and improving the arrangement.’

16Thodorico monachi praefatio in vitam S. Martini papae, in Mai, vol. cit., p. 294. On Theodoric the monk, see A. Poncelet in Anal. Boll.,

vol. xxvii, pp. 5-27. [written in “so countrified a style, clumsy and

80 NOTES ON CHAPTER III spurious, that educated ears are horrified rather than charmed.” | 17An example is an author of the Carolingian age who, when working over the Life of St John of Réomé (d.c. 544), adds this sentence: “Et ne quis hoc fabulosum putet esse quod dicimus, referente viro venerabili Agrippino diacono, ipsius Agrestii filio, cognovimus”. See M.G.H., Scr. rer. Merov., vol. iii, p. 504. 18Passio Perpetuae, 1.5.

19Passio S. Andreae, n. 1. Bonnet, Acta Apostolorum apocrypha, vol. ii, 1, p. 1; cf. Acta Barnabae, n. 1, ib., vol. il, 2, p. 292. 20De martyribus Palaestinae, 3, 6, 8.; cf. Anal. Boll., vol. xvi, pp. 122127.

21Passio S. Sebastinae, n. 1, Acta SS., June, vol. vi, p. 60. 22This proceeding was already familiar to early novelists: EK. Rohde, Der griechische Roman, p. 271. 283A. Vassiliev, Anecdota Graeco-Byzantina (Moscow, 1893) p. 1.

24Bibliotheca hagiographica graeca, p. 47, nn. 3, 6. 25 Anal. Boll., vol. i, p. 359.

26Viteau, Passion des saints Ecatérine et Pierre d’Alexandrie (Paris, 1897), p. 23.

27Acta SS., May, vol. iv., p. 149; cf. Anal. Boll., vol. xxii, pp. 320-328. 28 Acta SS., July, vol. v, pp. 31-32.

29Catalogus cod. hagiogr. graec. biblioth. Vaticanae (Brussels, 1899), p. 132.

80H. Delehaye, “Saint Cassiodore”, in Mélanges Paul Fabre (Paris, 1902), p. 44. 314A cta SS., Oct., vol. iii, pp. 114-138. 382A cta SS., May, vol. ii, pp. 803-830. 83 Anal. Boll., vol. xviii, p. 405. 34K. von Dobschiitz, Christusbilder, p. 12.

35Sermo 315, n. 1, P.L., vol. xxxvili, p. 1426. [“We can hardly find enough particulars about other martyrs to read in public on their feast

pp.24ff. ,

days, but this martyr’s passion is set forth in a canonical book.” | 36See Duchesne, Le Liber pontificalis, vol. i, pp. c-ci. 87Anal. Boll., vol. xvi, p. 239; Dufourcq, Les Gesta des martyrs romains, 38Peristeph., xi. 39P.G., vol. xl. p. 336. 40P.G., vol. xlvi, p. 737. |

41See Synaxarium eccl. Constant., Propylaeum ad Acta SS., Novembris, p. Ixvi.

42'The same preference appears very clearly in the Greek life of St Gregory the Great; we have attempted to show that this document was written by means of selected extracts sent to Constantinople by the Greek monks of the Caelian Hill at Rome (Anal. Boll., vol. xxiii, pp. 449-454). 43'This can be easily verified by means of the lists of Latin and Greek

NOTES ON CHAPTER III 81 hagiographical manuscripts published by the Bollandists in many volumes of Analecta Bollandiana following 1882, and separately. 44’‘This sequence of alterations has been excellently set out by P. Monceaux, Histoire littéraire de ?Afrique chrétienne, vol. i (Paris, 1901), p. 62. 457. Loth, “Saint Amphibalus’, in Revue Celtique, vol. ii (1890), pp.

348-349. ,

46/Aemilian asked: “Are you a bishop?’—Fructuosus the bishop replied: “I am.”—Aemilian said: “You were.” And he gave sentence that they were to be burnt alive. | 47 Acta SS., Jan., vol. ii, p. 340. 48Acta SS., Jan., vol. i, p. 569.

49Tbid., p. 570. Cf. E. Le Blant, Les Actes des martyrs, p. 30. [“The lion

eagerly bounds forward to adore the maiden, not to devour her.’’] 50*Les deux saints Babylas”, in Anal. Boll., vol. xix, pp. 5-8.

51°*It should be known”, say the synaxaries gravely, “that there are three groups of martyrs named Cosmas and Damian: those of Arabia, who were beheaded under Diocletian, those of Rome, stoned under Carinus, and Theodota’s sons, who died in peace” (Synax. eccl. Constant., 1 July, p. 791).

528t Martin, bishop of Terracina (of Tours), on Nov. 10; St Martin, bishop of France, on Nov. 12 (Synaxarium,) pp. 211, 217.

58The Greeks keep the feast of one St Theodore (Stratelates) on Feb. 8 and of another (Tiro) on Feb. 17. The Latins celebrate the two saints respectively on Feb. 7 and Nov. 9. Acta SS., Nov., vol. iv, pp. 11-89;

Delehaye, Les légendes grecques des saints militaires (Paris, 1909), pp. 11-43.

54E. A. Stiickelberg, “Die Kephalophoren”’, in Anzeiger fiir Schweizerische Altertumskunde, 1916, p. 78, gives a long list of saints who were legendarily cephalophores; it could easily be made longer. 55P, Franchi de’ Cavalieri, I martiru di §. Teodoto e di S. Ariadne (Studi e Testi, 6), p. 145; the Passion, pp. 149-161. 586Anal. Boll., vol. xiii, p. 164.

57An account of the translation of the three martyrs, quoted by the priest Leo in the prologue to the Passion of SS. Trypho and Respicius, is lost; Mai, Spicilegium Romanum, vol. iv, p. 292. According to an old writer, Pope Honorius ITI gave the three bodies to the basilica of St Mary Transpontina: A. Mastelloni, La Transpontina (Naples, 1717), p. 93. 58See an example in G. Finazzi, Delle iscrizioni cristiane anteriori al vii secolo appartenenti alla chiesa di Bergamo (Florence, 1873), pp. 16, 30, 41; A. Mazzi, I mariiri della chiesa di Bergamo (Bergamo, 1883), p. 14. We have given other examples of the same kind in the article on St Cassiodorus in Mélanges Paul Fabre, pp. 40-50. Several dozen inscriptions

bearing the abbreviations B.M. before the name of the deceased have provided the scholars of Sardinia with as many martyrs. Thus they read Hic tacet b.m. Speratus as Hic tacet beatus martyr Speratus, and so on. The interesting collection of inscriptions compiled on these principles

82 NOTES ON CHAPTER III may be seen in D. Bonfant, Triumpho de los santos del regno de Cerdena (En Caller, 1635).

59We have examined this question in Anal. Boll., vol. xviii, pp. 407; 411, and later in the volume called Sanctus (Brussels, 1927). 60Sometimes only a couple of words or less was needed to start the most

extraordinary legends. In the inscription C. Iulius. L. F. Caesar. Strabo. aed, cur. q. tr. mil. bis. X. vir. agr. dand. adtr. iud. pontif. (CIL, vol. 1,

p. 278), the two last words were read as IVD(aeorum) PONTIF(ex), and this was referred to the treaty of friendship between the Jews and the Romans quod rescripserunt in tabulis aereis (I Mach. 8: 22). Hence this precise statement in the Mirabilia (see Jordan, Topographie der Stadt Rom, vol. ii, pp. 470-471): In muro S. Basilit fuit magna tabula aenea, ubi fuit scripta amicitia in loco bono et notabili, quae fuit inter Romanos et Iudaeos tempore Iudae Machabaei. Incidentally, the inscription in question was not engraved on bronze but on a marble tablet. 61Anal. Boll., vol. xvi, pp. 30-40. 62Tbid., pp. 19-29. ®8Thm, Damasi epigrammata, n.